new pictures on my wall!!!

Dear Lily and Sam and Momma,

Today was a very fun day for Gigi!  I took the turkey hats to the post office so you should be able to wear them in time for turkey day!  Then I came home and found my special order of PICTURES in my mailbox!  I just ordered them on Monday and they came today - - YAY!

I had to go back to the store and buy more frames (oops).  I already bought most of them before I ordered the pictures, but I didn't know about the 5x7 pictures I was going to buy!  But then, silly Gigi only bought 2 frames for the 3 pictures - - I don't know what my brain was thinking, but I forgot!!!  When you see the pictures of the pictures, remember there's one more picture to be framed and put up!

Okay, so here are some pictures of the pretty display that I made out of your momma's pretty pictures!

First, we had to get the set-up just right before we started hanging them up on the wall!  The kitty helped.

Then Grampa put them up on the wall . . .

You have to imagine one more 5x7 in a 'landscape' frame in the middle of the top - it's the picture of momma with Grampa and Gigi.





















Also, Aunt Stephanie is pretty proud of the picture on the bottom right - she used photoshop and she took out the tower that was wrapped in a tarp (the part under construction) - - she made it into the sky!  It was the coolest castle on the river, but then there used to be an tower that wasn't finished!

This is a close-up of the pictures in the collage frame in the middle - so Momma can see which pictures we chose - - they're all our favorites!

You'll have to see them all when you come to Gigi's house the next time - I can't WAIT!!

Love,
Gigi

I love fall!

Hey Girlses!!!
I love you so so much!  I decided to take some pictures of my 'fall' display on my dining room table before I send you the pictures of the kitchen. I keep telling you about the kitchen (and it really is nice) but I sorta want it to be "all the way done" before I take pictures of it!

So, I went to Hobby Lobby and a few other places last week and made a beautiful autumn table-scape - I really like it!

I actually have that table cloth in TWO sizes (this is the bigger one because the leaf is in the new table) because we really like how it goes with the room color. Grampa likes keeping the leaf in the table, but I like the table smaller especially since there are only 2 of us home right now!  One day a week, Uncle Brother eats dinner with us, but he fits at the table when it's small anyhow!

So, I got that tiny hay bale because I thought it would look cool - - and it does, but you know what?  Hay bales are MESSY!!!  It sheds little pieces of hay all the time - ugh!  but it is cute there, so I'm keeping it for now!  The yellow and orange daisies were from Wegman's - and see the 2 yellow roses at the bottom?  The were left from 6 yellow roses that Rachel got us when we came home from Germany. (they died a couple days later and I had to throw them away).  The bowl of candy corn isn't lasting very long either . . . I got some for you, too!  I sent you a fall package last Thursday (October 3rd) so it should get to you some time this week!  Hopefully before mommy and daddy go on their trip, or you won't see it till next week.

Right now it is raining really hard, but it was funny because when I woke up it was bright and sunny out! Bright and sunny lasted for about an hour and then it got windy for an hour or so and the clouds rolled in! The rain started about 10:00 and it's been raining REALLY hard for almost 2 hours!  Weather is funny.

I love you - and I'll talk to you again soon!
love,
Gigi

hi - remember me?

Hi Lily and Sammy!
Remember that time I used to send you pictures and letters on my blog every once in awhile?  Well, I kept forgetting to post anything for a really long time and I'm sorry!  I will try to send you blog entries more often from now on.

Guess what happened with our kitty Caesar when we got home?  He missed us SO MUCH that he slept in Gigi's big huge suitcase for the whole day until I had time to unpack it.  These were our clean clothes, not our dirty ones (I had already put those in the laundry) . . . I think he was happy to get to sleep on something that smelled like his people!  Such a silly kitty!

Later this week, I will try to send you (and mommy) some pictures about Gigi's new kitchen.  You probably won't be able to understand them until you come and see it yourself, but it's really pretty!

I love you very much and miss you too!
Love,
Gigi

KITTIES!

Hello Girlses!

This post is all about BRUTUS and CAESAR - two silly kitties that live at Gigi's house.

Brutus is the older kitty - and he is very big and fat.  He doesn't like to play as much as Caesar does, he mostly likes to eat and sleep!

Caesar is the younger kitty - he is getting pretty big, but not so fat!  He likes to eat, and he sleeps sometimes, but he also likes to play outside during the day time and he likes to play with his toys and he likes to snuggle with Pa, too!

Caesar likes to play with Brutus, but Brutus doesn't like it very much!  It looks a lot like Caesar is fighting with Brutus, and sometimes Brutus gets mad and 'hisses' at Caesar.  But that usually doesn't make him stop!  Brutus used to sleep on this chair most of the time, but ever since Caesar came, Brutus doesn't like to sleep there any more!

Caesar likes to sleep on that chair now!  And he plays on the top of it and he says MEOW!

Both kitties still love to get treats - only most days, Gigi forgets to give them treats - I think they miss having Lily and Sam here to give them lots and lots of treats!!  Here's a funny picture of TWO kitties sitting with Pa while he's watching TV.  Usually Brutus will go away if Caesar jumps up on the chair with him, but once in awhile, he stays on the chair and sleeps even if Caesar comes up!

Gigi loves her kitties . . . but she love you both even more than the kitties! Pa says he's going to get the rest of the kitchen cabinets into the house this weekend, so I think I know what my next blog post will be about! 

I LOVE YOU FOREVER!

love, Gigi

fall is beautiful

Dear Lily and Sam,
This post will mostly be pictures . . . last year in October, you were at my house for some of the month!  This year you are in Germany.  I see that the di-soar park has a nice pumpkin display - that's a fun part of fall to go to a farm (or a park) and see fun pumpkin displays!  Did you bring a pumpkin home yet?  Can you get a pumpkin in Germany?  Are the leaves changing colors in Germany?  From Momma's blog, fall in Germany looks something like fall in NY.

Remember when we went to the park?  These are some pictures I took today when I was walking around that same park while Aunt Stephny was working (and after she finished.  You can also look back and see the same park in the spring on my blog post from April!

I hope you are having a HAPPY FALL TIME in Germany - and that you get to spend some time playing in some leaves!

Love you forever!
Gigi

ps - Lillian, that picture is NOT Gigi - it's definitely Aunt Stephny!

fall stuff

Dear LJ and SJ,
What do you like best about fall?  I like it best when the weather gets cooler and the leaves start changing colors!  I also love the yummy tastes of fall things like pumpkin and apple treats - YUMMO!

On Friday, it was very cold and rainy!  Blah, I don't really like that kind of weather!  But I got a "happy fall" card and beautiful leaf and sticker picture from my girlses in Germany - YAY!   Mrs. Snapp and I went out to Applebee's for lunch that day - it was fun, we haven't talked in a long time!  Then when I got home, my new stove was delivered - YAY!  Mr. Darrenkamp came that afternoon and installed the stove - TA-DA!! Here it is, my pretty new stove!

On Saturday, Pa decided not to work on the kitchen project that weekend because we had SO MANY other things to do!  First, Pa needed to go shopping for some work clothes. We went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast and then went to Kohl's for a bunch of dress pants and shirts.


Then we came home and Pa covered up the pool for the winter and Gigi canned 7 pints of diced tomatoes.  The tomatoes weren't from our garden, we didn't have that many.  Mrs. Slack went to a produce auction on Thursday and she brought me a bunch of tomatoes and some beans, beets, peppers and squashes.


I did some more canning and freezing on Sunday, I made 8 pints of salsa . . . we haven't had a chance to taste it yet, but I am planning to make some taco salad when Aunt Bethany is home.

We also cleaned up around the deck and the back yard after the pool was closed up, but we left the umbrella on the table up . . . I'm not really sure why we did that, I guess we just forgot!  We also emptied the hot tub, cleaned it and filled it back up, but we couldn't go in the hot tub until Sunday because it was still too cold!

On Sunday, Pa also took all the air conditioners out of the windows so now the cool breezes aren't coming in any more!  YAY!  This is how the living room wall looks now with the pictures back on the shelf, can you see the picture of you on the shelf?







Also on Sunday, Aunt Tanna moved to her new house - I am sure she will still come over to see you when you come to visit because she is still living in Corning!  This is how her room looks now - very clean and empty!








BUT, remember I told you that the other side of the basement was really MESSY?  It still IS really messy, see?  That's the next thing on my list of things I have to do, but I really don't know when I'll get to it!

Yesterday, it was SO cold that Gigi had to start a fire all by herself!  I did such a great job that it was TOO HOT in the living room and we had to open windows up at lunch time to make it not so hot!  Today, it was HOT out - I sure don't understand the weather in New York!  so weird!!









For supper yesterday we had DELICIOUS French onion soup!  This picture isn't as good as Momma's beautiful food pictures, but trust me the soup was delicious!!  Pa really liked it!  I got the recipe on Pinterest and I had to buy a special kind of cheese called gruyere cheese - but they had it right at Wegman's, so that was cool!

The kitties really like it in the fall when the fire is going . . . 

they like to be a warm and snuggly!

Coda, the bear is in his comfy chair waiting for you to come see us!

I love you so much - give Mommy and Daddy a hug for me, okay?

love,

Gigi

  

so much to show you!

Hi Girlses!!!
So much is going on in Gigi's house since all my girls left, I thought I should take some pictures for you to see what's happening!

First of all, when I got back from taking you to the airport, Grampa had put the doors back on the china cabinet!  We are very excited about how great that wall is going look when we get done!



Then Grampa took out the dishwasher and the Tupperware cupboard and WOOHOO! we don't have a maze to walk through in the kitchen!  This is Gigi's happy face!

THEN, Grampa took out the REST of the cabinets from the kitchen!  

So now we have the 'space' ready for the stove that we bought the other day - - it gets delivered this Friday and we hope Mr. Darrenkamp can install it that day, too!

And this is where we have stuff right now - - the new fridge will be sorta where the fridge is now, but the pipe needs to be moved still!  Where the stove is now will be where the pantry will go.

I had to go to Horseheads the other day so I went to Verizon and got a new SMART phone - but I think the phone is still pretty much smarter than me!  Hopefully I'll be able to figure it out soon!

Mommy will be happy about the other thing(s) I got at Hobby Lobby - picture frames!

And THIS is what the pictures look like on the wall - - can you see the can of paint that Grampa found to touch up some spots on the wall from the way the pictures were before?

I moved most of the toys back to the basement to store till you come back to see me! But I won't show you what the basement looks like right now - it's a MESS!

We have had a couple of fires in the woodstove because the furnace isn't hooked back up yet!  Gigi still needs to take the curtains down!

And the big KITTY says it's time for him to go outside, so I guess it's time for me to say good-bye!  I love you very much and I will try really hard to post more pictures on my blog more often!

Love, Gigi