Humor
Some people are just naturally happy. That is exactly what I have seen of my husband, Bob throughout our life together, and from the pictures taken during his childhood. Bob’s family took many pictures when the kids were little, and many were spontaneous, so the smiles could not have been planned, and yet, there they were, planted squarely on Bob’s little face. I have looked through a lot of old pictures from when Bob was little, and it’s easy to see the great sense of humor he has.
Bob has always liked things that make him laugh. 
Two of his all time favorite shows are “The Three Stooges” and “Laurel and Hardy”. In fact, Bob can do a perfect imitation of Stan Laurel when he was doing his whiney face/rub the head thing. It makes me laugh every time he does it. When I am in another room, and Bob is watching a comedy that makes him start laughing, I can’t help but laugh too, because his laugh is contageous. He loves a good comedy show or movie!! He’s not into some of today’s stupid comedy, but the good old fashioned, truly funny comedy…now that’s funny and he could watch it all day.
Of course, laughing at good comedy isn’t the only way to get a laugh. Making other people laugh is just as much fun, and Bob is quite good at that too. He loves to make faces designed to make people laugh, in fact, quite often when you are trying to get him to pose for a picture, you might very likely get a stick out your tongue moment instead of a smile, because he wants to turn the situation around and make you laugh. Our girls are very used to the things their dad might do to get them to laugh, but even they can’t help but laugh to the point of making a face too…it’s just that funny. There really is nothing quite like a good laugh.
My niece, Kellie has always had a wonderful sense of humor. She has to be the giggliest person I have ever met. Anyone who is her friend, or who has worked with her can fully attest to that. Kellie likes to do things that make people laugh.
When I call my mother’s on Wednesdays to give her a pill reminder, Kellie usually answers the phone, as she and her mom, my sister Allyn, and Kellie’s sister, Jessi come to my mom’s for lunch on Wednesdays. She is always teasing me that I am interrupting her time, and I should just get off the phone!! She loves to joke around that way.
Kellie has always had a contagious laugh. All she had to do was laugh, and you could not resist joining right in. Even if you didn’t know what was so funny, you had to laugh, because she was laughing, and she made it seem like a laughing moment, so everyone had to laugh.
About a year ago, Kellie followed in the footsteps of her aunt, me and her cousin, my daughter, Amy, and became an insurance agent. The agency she works for dresses up for Halloween, so Kellie has come up with a couple of really good costumes, but this year’s really takes the cake. As an independent agent, Kellie writes for Progressive Insurance, so Kellie decided to go with the popular option, and dress up as Flo.
Of course, as we all know, there can be only one Flo, so I have looked her picture over very well, and I have determined that there must be two Flo-Bots. The first model looked a little too much like a robot, and so couldn’t really pass for the real Flo, but I think this second model has been highly upgraded to look like a pretty good Flo double. Not quite close enough to fool someone who knows Flo well, but as Flo would say, “She’s pretty good…She’s pr-ett-y good.”
I had hinted toward a story a few days ago, and I think today is a good day to take that one further. My niece, Ashley is a very good mom to her daughter, Reagan, and to her little animal children. Everyone needs to be cleaned up and polished. Ashley was this way even before Reagan was born. So every so often, the puppies and kitties must have a bath. Now we are all used to puppies having a bath, but I had never known anyone who gave their kitties a bath before. In fact, thought that was rather dangerous…for the one bathing the cat. I mean, cats have sharp teeth and claws.
In fact, that danger is something Ashley found out periodically, when her 
cat scratched or even bit her for doing something the cat didn’t like. I have to say that Ashley is a brave woman to keep coming back. I think that after a cat bit me, I would most likely be too nervous to stick that cat back in the tub, but Ashley and Eric want the cat to be a well rounded kitty. Once again, ok, but I think I would probably find a different way to round him out. Ashley is a very brave girl.
I would expect the cat to not like her very much after, what he might consider such mistreatment, but somehow the cat, as well as all her other animals, love Ashley to 
pieces. They somehow look at the cat bath as…well, maybe just an Ashley-ism, and so even if their cat friends don’t have to take a bath, it’s ok, because they know their mommy loves them, and maybe their friends are just not loved quite as much as they are. On that, I would have to almost agree. Maybe their cat friends are loved as much, but they certainly are not loved more than Ashley loves her cats, dogs, and horses, because that would be impossible.
Ashley has been an animal lover all her life, and every animal she has ever been around knows that very well. She cuddles, and pampers, bathes and then dolls up her pets, until they are among the most handsome you have ever seen. They look and feel very loved, because they most certainly are.
My niece, Susan was the last of the nieces on Bob’s side of the family, and in fact there would not be another girl born in the family for 15 years. That, in itself, was surprising, because up until that time, the family had been mostly girls. You could say that we were very used to little girls and their ways. Susan was unique in some things, such as her imaginary friends. Yes, many people have imaginary friends as children, but she was the first, and I believe the only one in our family to have them, and we all thoroughly enjoyed their antics.
Through the years, I have watched Susan go from being a cute litle girl, who always made us laugh, to a beautiful woman, wife, and mother to her 2 daughters. Susan has a sweet spirit, and a bit of a shy smile, but inside her lives a heart of gold. I don’t get to see her as often as I would like, since she lives in Powell, and in many ways I feel like those of us who live here have missed out on all the good things Susan is.
One thing I didn’t know about Susan is the outdoorsy girls she is. When I look through her pictures, I see her camping with her family and fishing with her little Kaytlyn, which is quite 
funny, since Kaytlyn was not impressed with the fish they caught. And I can’t blame you Kaytlyn. I like to eat fish, and I don’t mind fishing, but someone else needs to put the worm on and take the fish off…that is just a rule!! But Susan took it all in stride, and Kaytlyn made it through that horrible ordeal with that monster from the water. Whew!!
The years have flown by so fast Susan!! I remember when you were just a newborn, and now you have children who aren’t even babies anymore. It just doesn’t seem possible. Today is Susan’s birthday, and we want to wish her the very best of birthdays. Have a great day, Susan!! We love you!!
I liked my nephew’s now wife, Ashley from the moment I first met her. She was sweet, funny, and she was a great fit into our family. And I was delighted when Eric asked her to marry him, because the longer I knew her, the more I liked her. Now, a little more than a year after their marriage, Eric and Ashley are expecting a new baby any day, and we are all very excited about that new little life. So much has changed since that first time Eric introduced us to his girl.
Ashley has a great sense of humor, as anyone who knows her can attest. Sometimes, her humor is almost surprising, and you find yourself laughing hysterically. She can be almost a tomboy, and yet turn around look beautiful all dressed up. Of course, to pull that off, a girl has to be beautiful on the inside, and that is what Ashley is. Her positive personality is refreshing in so many ways. She doesn’t spend much time on the things that she can’t do anything about, but rather focuses on the little blessings that can fill everyday life, if we don’t overlook them. It is an attitude that wins people, and that is exactly what Ashley has a way of doing…winning friends. I think our family has been very blessed with the addition of Ashley.
Ashley has a love for all animals that is very impressive. Her family raises horses, including 
miniature horses, which are very cool, by the way. Eric and Ashley recently bought a house next door to her parents, partly so they can be close to the horses they both love. Watching Eric and Ashley with the various animals they both love is very sweet, and as in the case of the cat’s bath, it can be very humorous, and perhaps the subject of another story in the very near future. It is also, very Ashley! She is a very unique person, and I think it is that uniqueness that makes her so interesting, and such a great part of our family. Today is Ashley’s birthday. Happy birthday Ashley!! I hope that new addition to your family arrives really soon, because we are all ready to meet her…and I know you are ready for her to arrive…really ready!!
As a little girl, my mom was always on the go. She had long slender legs that she though were too skinny at the time. Don’t most of us wish we had such a problem these days. Of course, most kids, especially back then were in pretty good shape. Kids didn’t sit in front of the television set…probably because they didn’t have one, but even if they had, they probably wouldn’t have watched it much. It just wasn’t what kids did back then.
Mom didn’t really change very much over the years. She was still slender even after having 5 children. I have looked at pictures of her over the years, and I always notice her tiny shoulders…which are so unlike my own, not huge, but square shoulders. She looked like a little kid in our family pictures while I was in high school. I just couldn’t believe just how tiny she was. She didn’t look like she could possibly be the mom.
One thing I will never forget about my mom is how fast she could walk. When she was working at Kmart, she was over a huge department. When we would go over to take her 
breaks with her, she was really hard to keep up with. She was walking, but we practically had to run to keep up with her. Talk about power walking, my mom was an expert at it. If we showed up for her break and she was getting something for a customer, or to stock the shelves…well, good luck trying to catch her.. She was a woman on a mission, and you were going to have to run to let her know you were there.
Of course, time, knee problems, and age have take their toll now, and mom can no longer walk so fast. She still gets around pretty well, but the days of the power walk are over for her. It’s funny that in our minds we still think we could do it…at least for a while, but in reality, we don’t realize the ability is gone until it is long gone, and then we can only look back sadly, and wish we could get those days back…somehow.
My nephew, Ryan takes after his dad, my brother-in-law, Chris in many ways. They are both very tall at about 6’4″. They also tend to use that towering height to their advantage when they are doing their favorite pass time…picking on those who are smaller than they are…which is pretty much everyone, so don’t think you are safe in this matter, because no one is safe!! Ryan has a great sense of humor, and loves to pretend that he didn’t do it, even though no one buys into that story! If Ryan is behind you or even in the general vicinity, you already know who did it…unless his dad is in the area too.
Ryan wasn’t always so big, of course. He had to start somewhere, and while he had little chance of being short, and he was a tall kids at every stage of his development, he still had to go through childhood like all kids did. He had some great humor role models during those years. His Grandpa Spencer was a teaser from way back, and Ryan, being the observant child that he was, quickly learned the lessons taught by his grandpas and dad. He couldn’t wait until he was big enough to fully participate in the tease-a-thons that were always standard procedure in our family. I’m quite sure he actually started his practice on his mom, my sister, Allyn and sisters, Jessi, Lindsay, and Kellie, who by the way can hold their own in any tease-a-thon, so I’m sure they all honed their skills on each other to perfect this skill.
Ryan was always a good boy…teasing aside, and has grown into a wonderful man, husband, dad, son, nephew and grandson to our entire family. These days he spends his time picking on his wife, Chelsea, and teaching his kids Ethan and Aurora the ropes, because if Ryan has anything to say about it, his kids will be as good at teasing as he is. It 
is a big job to pass on the time-honored traditions of a family, and like my dad, Ryan’s grandpa, it can be a very tiring job too, for adult and child, so of course, you need to make sure you get lots of sleep…which is something else Ryan is quite good at, but then again, he had a great teacher!! Today is Ryan’s 26th birthday, so if you happen to be around him at all, give a little bit back…teasing that is, because it takes a bunch of us to ever really get one over on Ryan!! Happy birthday Ryan!!
A couple of weeks ago, my granddaughter, Shai was asked to bowl on our Monday night league. She decided to, even though she had only bowled two other times in her life, and really didn’t know how. Like most of us, she thought there was nothing to it. Last week on her first week as a regular bowler, she began to have second thoughts and a bad case of nerves. She didn’t know how to do the approach, and nothing felt right. To top it off, she was faced with all the other bowlers, who have bowled for years. The night couldn’t have been much worse for her, and I couldn’t help her, even though I am a trained coach, because we were both bowling, and there simply wasn’t enough time. Shai set an average of 58, and by the end of the evening, she was convinced that this was a mistake, and she could never be a good bowler.
I promised her it would get better, and later in the week, I made plans to take her bowling so I would have time to coach her. Shai’s friend, Sterling was going to be a substitute on the league, so she came along. The first thing I told the girls was that they would be doing an approach, because it is the correct way to bowl, and the best way to improve quickly. There were some very funny moments, such as sliding on the wrong foot, and gutter balls that barely got past the foul line first, but they stuck with it, and in the very short hour that we had to get this lined out, the girls made great strides. Of course, the real test of our success would be the following week…this week.
The girls were nervous, but I assured them that they would do great. I reminded them 
that I didn’t want to see any bowling with no approach. They assured me that they would bowl correctly. It was time for the real test. I was glad that the girls were bowling next to each other. There is still comfort in having a friend nearby. They both did great. No, they didn’t break 100, but they had decent games. Shai went from having a 176 series the first week to having a 244 series this week, and while Sterling didn’t bowl last week, she had a 233 series this week. Last week, Shai was convinced that she didn’t like bowling. When I asked her how she felt this week, she said it was fun. All the seasoned bowlers made the girls feel welcome, both last week and this week, but the difference is that this week, Shai felt more like a real bowler. Here comes the next bowling generation.
Big sisters are a very unique type of person, especially when they are the oldest child. They have gone from being the only child to being a little mommy’s helper in the care of their new little sibling. They are usually young enough to have it in their head that this is their baby, so don’t even tell them that they can’t be the mommy! They don’t like it when you don’t let them be the caregiver of this new baby. Of course, as with any job, they know that there are some things that should be handled by the nanny (ie, Mommy)…like stinky diapers!! Mom is totally welcome to step in at that moment. And if this kid decides to scream, and a bottle won’t fix it, well, call in the nanny. Nanny/Mommy is good for some things, but not when the big sister is in charge. They are for when big sister needs a babysitter for the baby, and nothing more. It is almost as if Mommy is really a surrogate mommy.
While big sisters can be in the way for moms sometimes, it is also very sweet to watch there first attempts at mothering. Girls have a built in mother’s instinct, in most cases, and it comes out in them very early on. From the moment they hold their first doll, they are a mommy in their own mind. Of course, maybe that doll is the reason that they don’t care much for stinky diapers or screaming babies. I mean, that doll was just so much better behaved than that, right? Nevertheless, it doesn’t take long for them to realize that this new baby is a bit different than that baby doll they had, but as they get used to the new baby, they instinctively understand that crying and the smell is just a part of the deal with a younger sibling, so as long as Mommy or somebody else shows up for the tough times, the responsibilities of a big sister are not so bad.
Unfortunately, as the baby gets older, the newness also wears off some, and before the baby is old enpugh to play or walk, the older sister might get tired of helping out. It doesn’t always happen, but sometimes it does. If it happens, it is usually a short period of time, because 
before too long, the baby is old enough to play with its older sister, and then the fun really begins. With an older sister teaching the younger sibling the ropes, there is no telling what kind of trouble they can manage to get into. In fact, if you think about it, you can probably come up with a whole list of ways you got into trouble with your big sister’s help, or maybe for you it was a big brother, but that is another story.
When my granddaughter, Shai was a little girl, she was…well, a Drama Queen, as I think I have told you before. Many teenaged girls turn into Drama Queens for a time, but this was pretty much instantaneous for Shai. If you startled her, she came unglued. If you put her to bed, she came unglued. She had to be rocked to sleep, in order for Amy to get any peace during the day. Now, this wasn’t totally her fault, as some babies just startle easier than others, and of course, rocking her to sleep was so wonderful, that we all spoiled her in that arena, as well as plenty of rocking for her cousin Christopher.
Nevertheless, like her Grandma, Miss Shai did not like bugs…of any kind!!! With the possible exception of the lady bug. So, if she was playing, and she happened to see a bug, her instant reaction was to scream, “Budge…budge!!!”” This was her pronunciation of the word bug. I can understand her reaction, as I have been known to freak out about a bug my self. Even the tiniest spider, has the ability to make me cringe, as both my husband and my boss can tell you. Killing bugs…is simply not in my job description at home or at work!!! And I don’t think it is in Shai’s job description to this day either.
It’s funny that certain bugs don’t seem to bother us quite as much as others. I don’t mind Lady Bugs, and I don’t think Shai does either, and in the arena of other animals or insects, I love butterflies, but they really need to keep their distance, and yet I don’t mind if a Hummingbird tries to dive bomb me. Odd, I know, but that is just the way it is. I think that is another 
area that Shai and I agree on. One day she had a Hummingbird fly up to her shirt that happened to have a great big pink flower on it. She didn’t seem to be bothered by this little bird who obviously thought she was Hummingbird Feeder. She simply stood there until he realized that he was trying to eat from the wrong flower, and flew away, which of course took only a matter of seconds. I’m not sure what she would have done if he took longer. My guess is that she would have started screaming, “Budge!!! Budge!!”, and Amy would have had to rescue her from the horrible monster that she thought was her friend. I’m glad that was not the case. By the time she realized that the Hummingbird was that close, he was already gone.
