A very worthy cause for the holidays...support our men and women in uniform!!

I got an email tonight and I just had to blog and post it so that anyone who happens to read my blog from time to time can get the information on how to support our military. From a personal standpoint this organization flew our son home for Christmas last year and I can't even begin to describe how grateful I was for that gift, not to mention hearing the joy in Robert's voice when I called and told him "You've been ticketed!" the morning after he applied for a ticket through LBEH.ORG

It was so wonderful to us as a family to be together for the holidays and I cherish that even more this year because Robert is deployed and won't be home with us this Christmas...but I have the memories of last year thanks in part to the work that LBEH does. If you have it in your heart to donate even just $5 to help them bring a soldier or Marine home this Christmas, please do it...you'll have my gratitude but more than that you will feel so wonderful when you go to the site and you see the tickets that have been issued to those deserving men and women. Take it from one who knows first hand...our son was home with us last year because of the generosity of total strangers who simply donated a few dollars or some airlines miles.

Here is Ernie's Email to me:

Howdy all.

I just wanted to take a minute out and post an update on how LBEH
2007 is going. Right at the giddy'up, a Marine over in Okinawa, Japan
applied for (and received!) a ticket home for Christmas. She was
delighted! So delighted in fact, that I think she told everyone else
in Okinawa about the program, and before we knew it, we had over 30
tickets requests for international flights.

So I dunno if you've ever flown international before, but it ain't
cheap. Tickets are averaging $1,200. Some of you quick at math might
have done that in your head - 30 * 1200 = $36,000 in tickets. And
that's only the international requests - we've got another 100+
domestic ones, too.

To date, we've received $26,000 in donations. it's gotten to the
point where we've been forced to stop taking ticket requests from
some of the international people. I hope now you can see the bind we're in.

You've donated in the couple years past, and we really need your help
this year. There are 4,000 people on this mailing list. If you each
donate $10, we'll be in business and can take care of each of these
soldiers. As a reminder, LBEH is a bonifide 5013(c) non-profit,
meaning your donation, however LARGE or small, is tax deductible!

Please, please, please, please. -- if you haven't already -- please
toss a few dollars our way, we REALLY need your help.

The main site: http://www.lbeh.org

The (paypal) donation link:
https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=paypal@lbeh.org

The (other) donation link: http://www.lbeh.org/?help

Thank you for your continued support with this!

Ernie

Monday, another week begins...

...and today was a busy and full day of work for me. I learned something new and that was fun for me to learn...I made a poster!! We have a machine at the library that is the coolest thing I've seen in a long time! You put a regular 8X11 sheet of paper in the scanner and POOF! out comes a huge poster!! Now that was fun!!

It's going to be a busy week between working 3 days, a scrapbook class on wednesday night, Alex's winter concert on thursday and a meeting at work on friday night but each week brings us closer to Robert coming home so I welcome the craziness of being BUSY!! Hard to believe it but just 3 weeks from friday we will be on mom's doorstep getting ready to enjoy the holiday season with her. I am sure glad I did our stockings while I was down there for Halloween!! Didn't they come out great? I'm so crafty...hehehe!!

Pirates!!

I forgot to mention one thing about our trip into Toys R Us in Times Square yesterday...my favorite area is the Lego displays upstairs and there is usually something new each year and this year was no different. This picture is for a couple of my friends...you girls know who you are. :)

Cookies, scrapbooking and a trip into NYC

It's been pretty busy around here lately and I sometimes wonder where I find the time for it all but I manage...work seems to be cutting into my free time...what's up with that?

I mailed Robert a package with the next 4 episodes of their favorite show, "The Unit" on DVD...5 copies so that he'll have plenty to pass around to the whole squad/platoon.

I've been busy getting the cookies done so that I can get the packages out to my Marines in time for the holidays which are fast approaching...hard to believe it but just 26 more sleeps until we arrive on mom's doorstep to celebrate Christmas with her!! So far I have finished up 3 batches of tree and snowman cookies, 9 batches of chocolate chips cookies and 2 batches of rum balls. I still have to make the maple yule log cookies and then I am planning to make some fudge to add to the cookie tins...maybe just a few pieces in each.

Today was a super day in the city for Jim, Alex and I...the weather was glorious and we had a terrific time enjoying the show at MSG's theatre, we went to see Cirque Du Soleil's Wintuk and we really enjoyed it! After the show we enjoyed some delicious pizza at my favorite place in Penn Station and then we made our way up to Times Square to Alex's favorite spot in the world...the Toys R Us...three floors of pure bliss for any kid!!! Alex was very cute in the store and he kept telling me stuff that was so funny I had to keep from laughing out loud...he said that he had to keep breathing because he was so excited he didn't know if he could take it...especially when we hit the Bionicle area. I think we walked around several times before he finally made his choice of what he was going to buy with his money, it was all pretty funny.

After that we walked up a few more blocks and I took Alex into the M&M's store while Jim scooted on over to the Sam Ash music store down the street. The M&M's store is 3 floors and we just walked around and took some pictures and looked at everything in there...so much fun. All in all...a super family day!!!

The start of Thanksgiving week

So what are you THANKFUL for this year? I find myself thinking about it a lot and I really do have so many wonderful gifts in my life and it's hard to narrow it down to just a few things but I will try. So many people reply to my telling them that my son is deployed right now with, "Oh I'm so sorry..." and I always cut them off with, "Please don't do that...people don't feel sorry for me because I am proud of my son and I am grateful for his service because he is doing what he wants to be doing and he's doing a great job over there of protecting us!"

So first on my list of what I am THANKFUL for this year is Robert's bravery and willingness to serve his country. We are more than halfway done with this deployment and at the end of this tunnel is another chapter in his life and I know he is looking forward to that.

I am thankful for my home and having a safe haven to lie my head down each night surrounded by people who love me.

I am thankful for the friendships that I have with some wonderful people and it doesn't matter if I see them every day or every couple of months or years or even if I have never met them in person.

I am thankful that my brother has found love and is now settled in with Michelle in their new apartment and that they are only just 5 minutes from mom's house in case they need her or she needs them.

I am thankful that mom has some new friends and that she is always keeping herself busy and active but most of all I am thankful for the gift of her recovery from lung cancer and being free of it for over 2 years now.

I am thankful that we will be seeing Nancy and Paul at mom's for Christmas and that I won't have to walk around our home and feel the fact that Robert isn't home for Christmas this year.

I am thankful that we are going to be sharing our Thanksgiving dinner with Sylvie and Tom and the boys.

I could go on but those are the highlights....so what are you thankful for?

New Video from Rick Springfield

Another crop under my belt

I went to another crop this past saturday and I completed 18 layouts...I am nearly to my goal of the amount of pages I wanted to complete for 2007 so I'm really happy about that. This is just a few of my favorites. I love the one of Daisy because I did the background paper myself with stamps and ink.

Packages are POSTAL!!

Finally it's done...took me most of the morning to seal up the boxes and put the shipping labels on and of course I had to put the cookies in thanksgiving themed goodie bags. :) I decided to take Alex to the post office with me because well...let's face it....17 packages, I needed the help and I was sure glad that Alex was in a helping mood when he got off the school bus today.

We have HOW many boxes mom?? Wow....that's a lot. When we started to bring them in the post office and we each had 2 in our hands I told the clerk that I still had 13 more in the car and he looked at me and Alex said, "What do you expect...it's a mother's love when you have a Marine for a son." I couldn't believe he said that, I was floored!

My friendly post office clerk, Marc behind the mountain of boxes when he was about 1/2 done with my packages.
Alex enjoying his lollipop from Marc while waiting for me to be finished up...gee...think he was tired from carrying boxes in for me?

Bon Jovi at the ROCK

So I went to see Bon Jovi at the brand new Prudential Center in Newark on saturday and it was a 2 1/2 hour full out rock and roll show and I had a great time. The venue is the new home of the NJ Devils hockey team so the theme all around is skating and hockey...down to the ice lounge complete with tables that are silver on top to look like ice skating rinks...very cool place and the staff was amazing and so friendly. What cracked me up was that at the end of the concert as we were all exciting the venue all of the ushers were down in the lobby and applauding and cheering us as we were leaving and giving people high fives on the way out...too funny!!

There was a kiosk where you could have your picture taken for free and they printed it on the Lost Highway cover, how cool is that?? So Paula and I did it and I think it turned out great and it's going to be a nice memory of my night out to scrapbook for my "Book of Me".

Time for another round!

Well it's about time for me to mail out another round of packages to our sons...aka Robert and his squad...all 16 of them. Robert, Cailen, Riley, Derek, Thomas, Detric, Jacob, Ronald, Ruben, Andrew, Luke, Justin, Salvatore, John, Matthew and Nicholas--your Thanksgiving boxes will be mailed out on monday (hopefully!). I just have to address all of the labels and fill out all of the customs forms which is a bit time consuming but I'll get it done tomorrow and have all of the boxes in the car ready to go. It's so nice to have a picture of the 'family' to look at and to inspire me to do more for them...keeps me going until I see them all back safely at KBay in a few months.

Back from Florida and back to busy life

Alex and I had a lovely time visiting in Florida and spending Halloween with grandma. Our Jack O Lantern turned out pretty good, I think....Alex scooped out most of the guts and then he gave up and I had to finish it. I think it was pretty damn good, don't you? ;)
Alex was a storm trooper this year and he went out Trick Or Treating with his friends Nicholas and Drake and he had a blast and got an insane amount of candy! In Florida there is a lot of candy to be had because the kids are everywhere so the houses are stock full of stuff. Mom got 2 huge bags of candy and we ran out of stuff by 8pm. We had about 100 kids come around to get treats! The funny thing is that down there it is warm out so most everyone just hangs out in front of their house, outside in the driveway or in their garage with the door open and waits for the kids to come around. Robert set up all of his animated Halloween houses and stuff in the garage on tables and it was fun to see the kids enjoy looking at all of them in awe. Boy did I have a blast hanging out with mom in the garage...that is until the mosquitoes found me!! Ugh!! HAHAHAHA!!