Hey, Mom, Dad..... I'M HOOMMEEE......

Matthew Joseph Hipskind arrived safely

home Thursday evening. He had a long

2 hour trip from St. Vincent NIC Unit

in Indianapolis. He seemed to endure

the whole riding in the car thing just

fine. Sammy, Mallory, and Abby were

very excited to see their new baby brother.

Well the holiday didn't last long.

Friday morning Mom decided

it was time to get into a routine.

Here Matthew is getting his

first bath at home.Mom seems

to be enjoying it allot.

For some unkown reason it seems

Matthew isn't the happiest of

campers when it comes to

getting lotion put on him.

Mom deems it a necessary

evil. We can't have a flaky

baby in the house.

After all the fuss. After the drying. After the lotion. After getting dressed and a clean diaper.

Mom and Dad seem very happy with the new addition to their family.

Peaceful Baby.....

A wee bit of heaven drifted down from above,

A handful of happiness, a heartful of love.

The mystery of life, so sacred and sweet,

The giver of joy, so deep and complete.

Precious and priceless, so loveable, too,

The world's sweetest miracle, baby, is you.

Helen Steiner Rice

Hoping your day was all it could be.

God's Blessings

Survivor Night

Every Thursday it is the night for Survivor. I have been

watching it since they were at the Australian Outback.

I think it meets my sense of adventure. I would love to

go across country in a covered wagon ! Of course I

don't know where I would plug in my curling iron.

One of my favorite participants was

Rupert Boneham from the Indianapolis

area. He looks like a mountain man, and some

one you wouldn't want to meet on a dark street.

But he proved himself a teddy bear. This year

they are in the Micronesia Islands. It is the

fans against the Survivor Favorites.

Since my family knows what a fan of Survivor I am, Christmas one year I was overwhelmed with gifts with a Survivor theme. What fun it was to get them all. In this photo you see my Survivor shirt, my real Survivor Buff, a book, and the famous Urn that the votes go in. As you can see, I think I have been voted off the island once again! What were those people thinking?

It is so much fun being able to share conversation with the kids that watch the show. We all have different opinions about what is happening on the current show. We have stratagies of what contestants should do to further their ploy to be the voted the Million Dollars.

Be sure and don't call on Thursday nights. We will be watching intently the

real reality show....................Survivor !

Hope your day was all you wanted it to be.
God's Blessings

Wednesday is "Lunch with Lanice" day.

Wednesday is set aside for 'Lunch with Lanice'.

Now you may ask, who is Lanice. She is my very good goofy friend at Family Physicians. She took me under her wing when I first started working at FPA some (cough cough) 17 years ago. Give or take a few years. I have to keep reminding myself to say that. Little did she know, when she asked me to lunch that first day, that we would have so much in common and develop such a longstanding and close relationship. We have had many fun times and lots of laughs. I value her friendship so very much. She knows how I am regarding friendships. She is someone who I have no problem revealing my 'secrets' to. We have had many many long and meaningful talks. She has helped me through some very tough times, and I hope I have responded the same. Lanice is wise beyond her years. She is fair minded to all people regardless how she may feel about you personally. She is someone who I truly trust. Lanice is a Jewel in my small ring of friendship.

Everyone should have a friend like Lanice.

Now there are some real characters working at FPA. We have Julie the Jungle Woman, Linda the Loony, the new girl, who might remain anonymous until further notice, and F-Lorence the former K-Mart lady. These girls appear as normal people when you first meet them. But beware! They are really aliens from a far off planet named Npawgeih. They appear as normal people in the daylight. You would not want to run into them in the dark. They are scary. If you see these women at some time in our community....... R U N ..... Here is a photo of the scary women you might see in the dark.

One person at FPA, is the highly regarded, Insurance

Woman. She bears the burden of shuffling papers from here to there. She has attained this talent from many many years of professional training at the highly regarded Institute of Paper Shuffling in the renowned city of Treaty. After many years of unselfish training she is willing to share her expertise with anyone within earshot of her voice. We could call that Yellin', but for all practical purposes, we shall at this time just call it earshot distance. Roberta is revered by all who come in contact with her. We could say she scares the dickens outta us, but we won't tell her that.

On a serious note ( I know...me serious?) I really enjoy working with all the women at FPA. I couldn't ask for a better group of women to work with. Let the party begin !

Now on to a more normal state of affairs. Rick had a ballgame at Honeywell's this evening. Gosh oh mighty... they didn't win, but they played a good game. I think the refs were against us, aren't they always? I really enjoy watching Rick play ball. That comes from many years sitting on bleachers.

I enjoy going to Rick's ballgames for one more reason.

I get to spend time with my Beautiful, wonderful DIL

(Daughter In Law) Jennifer,and my funny ticklish grandson Spencer D. Always so nice to spend time with family.

Busy day once again doing nothing. How do I do it?

Tomorrow is another day.

God's Blessings

Oh No..... More Snow !

Woooooo hoooooo....... More snow today. When I got up this morning, you could still see the grass through the snow that was on the ground. We have since gotten enough to cover all the grass and then some. It was heavy stuff when you have to go out and shovel it. Good thing we have two snow shovels. I can follow behind Tom and shovel what he misses. Sounds like a good plan to me. It would be good snow for making a snow man. That is a project for another day.

Snow Snow everywhere.

Our lesson for today: Don't take things for Granted.

So many times in our life we get caught up in the day to day living and forget to stop and appreciate the people and things around us. Take the time to tell those that you love, how you feel about them. Pay forward an act of kindness. It will always come back to you when you least expect it. Each of us have so much to give to others. Share your knowledge, your time, and your gifts with those around you.

Hope your day was all it could be.

God's Blessings

Quilting and other stuff

In order for me to be able to do some quilting, I have always made myself get all my housework or what ever else may need done before I can start. Grrrrrr....I would rather not have that rule for myself, but it is necessary for me to not set things aside and do the things I would rather be doing. So...after getting the laundry all done, I sat down to do some hand quilting. I didn't realize I would enjoy doing it so much when I did the quilts for Cassidy, Lauren and Luke. I had such fun creating the quilt for Malia. I am currently working on a quilt that my Grandma Hazel put together. I took it apart and reassembled it with the blue material. She made each of the quilt squares. Wouldn't she be so happy to know that her quilt top was being put to good use? I have two that she pieced together. I plan on doing both of them. Here is a picture of the one I am working on now.

The back of your quilts are supposed to be as nice as the front. The back of this one is really going to be very pretty. I may try my hand at a quilt that has no piecing that has just the hand quilting on it someday soon. Always up for another challenge. Here is the back of this quilt.



This morning I worked on fixing the photos Mom took with the camera I gave her. She took photos of Mom and Dad each with Baby Matthew. They were a little dark. Somehow her camera's settings got messed up. I adjusted them so that when they take photos with it again it will be ok. I had to lighten and take the noise out of the pictures. I think they took really good pictures. I am glad they got pictures with Matthew. He may get to come home this Thursday. Wow....he is sure progressing along at a fast pace. Strong little man!

Matthews first photo.



Mom with Matthew Joseph Hipskind. He is in the NIC unit at St Vincent's in Indianapolis.

Dad with Matthew.

Another day of blogging tomorrow

Gods Blessings

New to Blogging

This is my first attempt at blogging. We will see how it goes.

First let me introduce ourselves. Tom thinks he is the head of the house, but in reality I am.

He likes to be know as the Big Kahuna. Little does he know it is just wishful thinking on his part.

After being married 40 years come May 24th, he should know who is in charge.

We have such fun together. It could be when we are traveling, shopping, or being with our family. May God Bless each of you as you travel through this journey called Life.

One of our favorite trips was to Newport Rhode Island with Jane.

This is a photo of Tom and I getting ready for a ride on a Schooner.

Jane absolutely loved the ride.

We had such a great time.

This was taken on Martha's Vineyard.

It was taken near the north side of the island.

We started the day out with lots of fog and ended it with plenty of sunshine.

How cool it is to be able to be where they filmed a movie.

This was at the movie site of Bridges of Madison County.

We just by chance once ran onto the site where they filmed the movie with Kevin Costner, Field of Dreams.

That is the blog for today.

On to another blog tomorrow.

God Bless you