Wow Phyllis he is BEAUTIFUL!!! He was born on my Amy's birthday at almost the same time LOL!! As someone already said...another little Aries with and "A" name to boot!! You've got your hands full but check in when time allows...we miss you!! Cheers! Susie

Peppi, Today Maggie, Max, DD, and I went uniform shopping for Maggie to go to big girl school:-( She looked so grown up and I didn't like it one bit! Of course she looked cute as a button so I had to give her that big ol sloppy kiss from her Auntie Peppi. She laughed and laughed when I told her that kiss was from Aunt Peppi in Chicago. Then she started making funny faces and crossed her eyes, in full uniform, and said " I want to go to Chicago!" I miss you too! Annie, I really miss you too! Life is sooooo good right now. It's ironic that my children all look like me in different ways. If you put them in a room and someone was told to pick out my children they would get it right. I'm so blessed! You have a fantastic beautiful family and I strive to make memories like you do. Thank you barnmom, in more ways than one. You have a beautiful family too! Chase, "Our" Gulf is such a mess...makes me very sad. Maybe one day they will cap that b@$^ard! You are so right about not denying DD#2. I looked so much like her in the day. Now that gravity has taken it's toll not so much. LOL! Monsigner came over last week and asked about you guys! Ya gotta love him! I miss you lots! Sherry, Aren't we all blessed with our families? You have one of the best! Miss you! Mitch, Thank you for all the nice things you say! I think you are very special seeing that you are the one that introduced me to the CF via HD:-) Jessy, Son makes me proud but you already know that! That hug from you will come on July 17 or 18. We have him home for another 2 weeks! Yay me! Pray hard that we don't get a big ol hurricane this year. If so even you may be affected. Cathy!!!! I miss you! Yeah, Logan has man hair now! LOL! Beverly, Do you see any resemblance in the above picture between DD#2 and I? LOL! Thank you for the compliment about my beautiful family. It's been 8 years of yearning but I'm finally seeing the fruits of my family additions.

Ohhhh shower ettiquite is such a pain! as much for the recipient as the person throwing them sometimes (due to folks like the mom in this situation. Had we not had ds 7 weeks early we would have had four showers. I have two very close friends who planned on but the guest list was getting obnoxious. When you have a baby in your 40s people just want to be involved. So those two gals split the big one up and hosted on different weeks and we made sure that there were no duplicate invites. And even that turned out to be a political nightmare! Then my assistant wanted to have an office one (a tradition at the office) and so did dh's. The sad part being we really didn't need anything. I only tell you this because it ended up being a rather awful stress on dh and I (all the wrangling for the invite they wanted etc). So my only advice is to chat with her first so she does not feel bad about it. I personally loved the love that went into the shower planning from all sides, but I hoped many times that one or all four would cancel! Apparently ds heard me because he came before the final three were to be held and then he was too I'll for me to be involved in a shower type party after birth. Bless that boy lol. A person as old as your loved one might want to invite special friends as well as family so try to give her the opportunity? And whatever you do don't invite Ron and Jeanette! (ok bad flashback lol). I think what you are doing is lovely (as long as it does not include shower games or those cheap pastel mints in diapers made of felt and paraffin).

good post nocargirl. About the picture...I so know how you feel. We took a picture of DD and us together this past summer 2008 (we got divorced in 1991). It is a very happy picture. All three of us laugh about somehting and DD stands in the middle and we hug her from both sides. Not only she looks happy but I and X look very happy too (happy to share DD). We stand on the sea shore actually standing up to our knees in the water, but it is very windy and cold but we try to push each other in the water. Yes picture was taken by SM as well. What is special about this picture that normally DD looks nothing like me and very little like her father but on that picture it was shocking how she looks like two of us combined. Everyone notices. Your post actually brought bitter sweet tears to my eyes because I felt for my daughter- she definitelly does not consider us getting back together but she was beyond happy being wiht mom and dad TOGETHER. it does not happen too often, we all live too far from each other.