The Kassel Family Project Life 365

Today was a wonderfully quiet day despite the fact that John appears to either have strep throat or an ear infection or both.  Most of the day was spent relaxing and snuggling with John, who needed Mommy to “nuggle me” a lot.  We did the typical Sunday stuff, such as laundry and straightening up the house, but mostly didn’t do much of anything.  I’m very relaxed this evening and it’s wonderful!

It was an extremely busy day today.  It started out with a trip to Home Depot for Kids’ Workshop.  It was a special trip today because Grandpa Ken and Grandma Marilyn were with us.  Grandpa Ken helped John build his picture frame, while Andy helped Laura.

After Kids’ Workshop, it was off to FlipzUSA gym for the Gymnastics Express Fall Performance.  Gymnastics Express is the travelling “gym bus” that comes to John’s daycare.  Unfortunately, John was in no mood to participate.  The great staff had me and Laura sit with John to try to convince him to participate.  We were never successful in getting John to participate, so I pulled the t-shirt off of John and put it on Laura.  She ended up doing the entire performance instead.  In the end, both Laura and John received medals and we thanked the owners for allowing Laura to “sub” for John.

After the performance, we went to Cracker Barrel for lunch and then home so the kids could take naps.  Unfortunately, naps were not in the cards for either of the kids, so they played while I straightened up the house.  Saturday evening was spent celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary with great friends and great foods.  The adults were a bit on the goofy side and hilarity ensued!  It turned out to be a fantastic evening filled with lots of laughter.  Thanks to everyone who came by!  It meant a lot to Andy and I!

To celebrate our 15th Wedding Anniversary, Andy and I went on the Columbia Star Dinner Train (www.dinnertrain.com) with some great friends, John and Melinda Adams.

What a wonderful, unique experience this was!  The train ride to Centralia and return was just over three hours.  We took advantage of that time to catch up with John and Melinda.  We don’t get to see them often because all of our lives are just crazy busy at the moment.  We thanked them for joining us and Melinda said to us, “We were so happy you asked us to share this with you.  You two have a lot of friends and we were so touched you chose us.”  How sweet that was to say!

Between conversation, we also had some wonderful food and wine.  We began with a bread appetizer and a wonderful cup of Butternut Squash Bisque.  After that came Prime Rib, Baked Potatoes, and Green Beans.  The meal was finished with a Pumpkin Pie topped with walnuts and chocolate.  We ended the evening feeling very full and happy.  It was such a great time with wonderful friends, great conversation, and great food!  We couldn’t have asked for a better evening!

Laura woke up this morning complaining of a sore throat and headache.  I looked at her throat and it wasn’t any bigger than it usually is, but it was a little red.  Thinking that it was largely nothing, I gave her some ibuprofen and sent her to school.  When I picked her up that afternoon, her teacher came to tell me that Laura had started crying about 3:00 pm and said that her throat hurt.  I took a look at her throat and then felt her forehead.  Sure enough, she had a fever and her throat was huge.  You could also here in her voice that her throat was swollen.  So, I immediately called the doctor and we have an appointment for tomorrow.  When we got home, I gave Laura some more ibuprofen and put her in her “Snuggle Bunny” pajamas and put her in bed.  She went right to sleep.  She slept most of the evening away and I never even bothered to try to put her in the bathtub.  Poor kiddo….

November 2, 1996, was the day that Andy and I got married.  Fifteen years have passed and what a time it has been.  Two apartments, a house, varying cars, two dogs, two cats, two kids, work, love, arguments, fun, friendship, highs, lows, life.  I would trade none of it.  We’ve certainly had our share of struggles.  We’ve had some really high, great times and some really low, awful times (I generally refer to it as “14 years of great and 1 year of crap.”).  Andy said to me the other day, “There is no way we are ever splitting up.  I think we’ve been through it all and we are both still here.”  He’s right.  I think we have been through it all, but even in those really low, awful times when I was so angry I couldn’t see straight, it never occurred to me that we wouldn’t make it through.  You just put your head down and slog on through because good times are around the corner.  He is my best friend, my rock, and my center.  When I’m down, he picks me up.  When he’s down, I pick him up.  We are together.  There simply is no other way.  I love you Andrew Kassel.  What a Wonderful World we have.

Today’s big deal is new tires on our truck.  The old Cooper tires were in very bad shape and desperately needed to be replaced.  It was good to get the new tires and they look great on the truck, but it was still frustrating.  The old tires were 60,000 mile tires and they lasted about half of that.  The tire place said that it was most likely because the truck was out of alignment.  Well, the Firestone shop checked the alignment yesterday and it was nearly perfect.  The old tires just wore out and very quickly.  No more Cooper truck tires for us.