Pictures of Steve at Disneyworld

This Disney trip was a very precious time for Stephen and I. All of our children together with their spouses and the grandchildren in one place for an entire week! That is a real special treat. The other thing that kept running through my mind - especially since Stephen's heart attack and all that we have been through the last few months was how very precious life is! My mind kept playing tricks on me as I would be laughing, enjoying watching the family interact one moment and then next I would find myself crying. I was not prepared for my mind playing over and over again how close we were to never having Stephen with us ever again. The tears would flow and I would have to walk away for awhile until I got control of myself. I was thrilled at how well Stephen handled the entire week. He kept up, played just as hard, ate just as much as the rest of us and enjoyed every moment. Periodically I would catch him holding his chest as though he was hurting, but most of the time he was a real trooper.

Yes, while on vacation....I did allow ice cream. After not having any ice cream for 6 months, man it tasted good!

Disney-mania

Grant's favorite Disney Character was Mickey Mouse. He kept calling him "My Mickey". Wherever Mickey was....Grant was there. Right before this picture was snapped, Grandma was holding Grant. Grant saw "my mickey" and crawled over uncle Jason and plopped right down on Mickey's lap.

Uncle Dan played alot with all of the kids, but I think that Kinsen had a "secret crush" on uncle Dan - because she....well, this picture says it all!

Look what the treasure box had in store for us the day we went to Animal Kingdom! Did our family look silly for the day? You bet!

The day we went to Mickey's Backyard BBQ, Chris could not decide how he wanted to wear his bandana, so he tried many different humorous ways - he had that thing on his head, on his feet, but wearing his bandana like a "bib" absolutely cracked me up!

Beutler's take on Disneyworld

Twelve "Beutlers" running around Disneyworld! Can't you imagine the chaos that created! We could not have had a better time! The pirate rooms were great fun! Here Grandpa is getting into the fun of playing on our pirate ship bed. A pillow fight - hey...pirates fight with swords, not pillows!














Okay....... Grandma will need to take care of this problem. Out of the treasure box came all kinds of pirate costumes, pirate hats, pirate swords, pirate suckers, pirate glasses, etc... and did we have fun!





















Mason, our youngest grandson got to be the captain!





Yes, "pirates" is a great game to play - The swimming pool at the Carribbean Hotel had a pirate ship to play on, a pirate castle with cannons that squirted water and of course there is nothing more fun that walking the plank - okay...no plank at this pool, but there should have been! We had to take the slide instead!














The evening we went to Mickey's Backyard BBQ was one of my favorite memories. Grant would not leave "Mickey Mouse" alone. He was right beside Mickey the entire evening.

Kinsen was a little apprehensive about "dancing" with everyone watching her, but by the end of the evening she was having the time of her life.

I had fun bringing red bandanas and bubble gum "bag of gold" for everyone. I know everyone complained that we all "matched" -oh, well, I think we looked great!

One last little explanation of a picture before I just post a bunch of pictures that show what fun we had last week at Disneyworld.......this is a picture of Jason taking his "little princess" to breakfast with Cinderella in the Magic Kingdom Castle tower.

I know you can't wait to see pictures of my Spring Garden

Okay, I know I already put spring flowers on this blog - but that was way back in April - it is May now, and new ones are blooming, and the Hosta's are getting humongeous! AND I am trying to learn my new camera. This first picture I was learning to place the focus in the distance so the things up close would be blurry.

This seconed picture is placing the focus on things up close so the background would be blurry! Pretty cool, huh?

My Rhodedendrum is blooming. I began planting this garden 5 years ago, see how mature the plants are becoming. They are filling in and the garden is so "green". Everyone who comes into my back yard this year says "Wow, it is so "green" back here! Oh, well, green is better than dead!

Sara, this is the little iris that I told you the flower was about the size of my index finger. It looks bigger in this picture - the other cool thing about this flower is that it is an tall as my waist.

Okay, now this is my "artistic" picture. You're going to love it! I blurred the background, just for fun. The name of this flower is "Columbine" - can you see that there are hundreds of Columbine blooming right now? I bet there are 50 feet of them!

How are we going to celebrate?

Since all the kids are graduating with higher education degrees, we decided that we were going to celebrate by going to Disneyworld for an entire week! We leave next Tuesday (the 26th)! We can hardly wait. We will be staying in a pirate room at the Disney Resort "The Carribbean" The rooms have beds in the shape of pirate ships, there is a crow's nest for the kids to climb in. We have never stayed on the Disney resort before, so this will be a real treat! And yes, Grandma has purchased pirate "stuff" and has all kinds of wonderful things up her sleeve! Aunt Stephanie has helped Grandma figure out what to do, when how, and where! Just wait until you see the picture of all of us at Animal Kingdom with Safari sunglasses and visors! We will be the laughing stock of the entire park, I'm sure. Our son says "not on your life" will I get him in Safari glasses - well, let's see!

Our concern about this trip revolves around Stephen as he has been having alot of arm pain. He is back in rehab again and we are afraid that he will have to have another heart cath and another stent. It is our hope that the blockage is from a gas bubble that has not worked its way out from Open Heart Surgery. We are doing rehab to eliminate all possibilities before they do another surgery. He also has a slipped sturnum that could be the cause of his great pain and his arm tingling. We are still going to Disneyworld. But you may wish to pray for Steve, for strength, for wisdom and patience.

What Parent could be prouder?

This year has been the year of Higher Education Degrees in our family. The first celebration took place a few months ago, when Sara's husband, Chris, graduated from Virginia Tech Med School and as an officer in the Navy.

Kendra, Jason's wife, graduated from Ball State with her masters in Journalism. She did not go to her graduation exercise, but she definately has her diploma. Kendra teaches at Indiana Wesleyan University journalism and she loves it.

Then May 10th, Stephanie's husband, Daniel, graduated from Duke University with a Master of Divinity. They have been appointed to a little United Methodist Church in Marion Indiana, called Christland UMC and will be moving back to Indiana in mid-June.

May 18th, Jason graduated from Notre Dame.

It was an interesting year for graduation ceremonies at Notre Dame as President Barak Obama gave the commencement address. As you all know, the controversy around his coming stirred alot of press coverage. We were prepared for all kinds of rioting and demonstrations, but actually once we got on Notre Dame's campus, we did not see one sign, one protest or anything.

During the President's speech, there were 4-5 interruptions with people yelling about babies being killed and the president supported abortion. It was a highly volitle situation as Notre Dame is a catholic school who is very vocal against abortion. There was security everywhere. The interruptions only lasted a few seconds before the hecklers were escorted out.

Spring from a man's point of view

Well, Steve read the blog the other day and said "Hey, this carries my name (mostholyrev) and you write about "girl" stuff. I don't think of mushrooms, flowers, circuses or anything of the sort, when May rolls around, I think of Race Car Driving! So, on Mother's Day, mind you, we went to Indianapolis to the Speedway and watch the pole time trials - just to usher in spring from a man's point of view!

Jason, Kendra, Kinsen and Jaybin actually invited us to go with them, so being a "mother", this arrangement suited me well also.

We ate Tenderloin sandwiches that were as big as a large frisbee. (I know, not heart healthy, but since we were ushering in Spring from a man's point of view, we had to eat Man-sized, deep fried, tenderloin that was smothered in mayonaise!) The kids ate corn dogs (or as Jaybin said "that's a good hotdog on a stick"!

I got to experiment with my new camera. I tried to get pictures of the cars, so here is the car picture I took to "usher in Spring from a Man's point of view!

Now, on to the better pictures - (from a woman's point of view anyway!)