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Tag Archive for family time

FaceTime with the Grandkids

Posted on June 30, 2015 by Renee Spindle

My grand-kiddies can be sooooo entertaining. They will be the generation that takes all of the new fangled technology for granted. They won’t be oohing and aahing over a new computer that’s about to be released, or some other gadget that just came on the market like the rest of us do. We didn’t have all the amazing gadgets that our grand-kids can get their hands on when we were kids. “The cloud” will morph into something completely different by the time they are young adults.

Quite frequently on any given weekday night, around Miss Madison’s bedtime I will receive a “FaceTime” call on my phone. This is the iPhone version of a video call. The call normally starts out with Madison making some sort of silly face into the phone.

This is a typical example of how our video call will start

Then she will finally say “Hi Grandma”. I’ll ask her what she had for dinner, or she’ll have something “important” to tell me about her dog, Daisy. We’ll chat for a few minutes, I mean seconds and then she usually gets distracted or she just hangs up on me with no warning. Madison is an expert at pressing that “red” button to hang up on me.

Evan on the other hand loves to have his Face Time calls all to himself. He really does not like to share this calling time with his baby sister. He loves to talk and say hi to anyone and everyone in our house. We always humor him and pass the phone around so he can talk to all of us. Sometimes he will have something to tell us, maybe a joke or something about his friends he needs to share. Then there are other times when he simply just wants to say “Hi”.

Here’s a few of my favorite Evan “selfies”. I usually find these on my phone or computer after he has gone home.

FaceTime is a great way for the grand-kiddies to stay connected to their Pop-Pop while he’s away on a business trip too. Plus it’s nice for Pop-Pop to chat with them when he can. It always helps him feel more connected to home while he has to be away.

If video chatting is new to your technology world use it often. It’s nice to be able to say hi to long distance relatives, or your husband who travels frequently for his job. In my opinion it’s a great way to stay and feel connected to your love ones.

What’s your favorite video chatting mode-Skype, Google Hangouts, or Facetime?

7 comments Posted in Family, Grandkiddies

A New Birthday Tradition

Posted on June 10, 2012 by Renee Spindle

This year I wanted to have a way to put up remembrances of the birthday parties we host here at the Party House. I am working on getting all of the birthday cakes, with the guests of honor printed out so I can make a cool board to pin them up on in our family room. It will be a great conversation piece for the next party here.

Since this is the beginning of June I thought it would be fun to share the birthday pictures with everyone from this year so far.

In January, we have my younger brother, Jim. He’s almost 50! Can’t wait until next January so we can surprise him with something!

Also in January is my niece, Mary and my Mom on February 3rd. They usually celebrate with a combo party. This cake was a lovely Butter Pecan cake, extremely yummy.

In March it’s our youngest daughter, Hilary’s, birthday. She just turned 25, man I’m getting old!

This was the no-bake lemon cheesecake. This recipe was posted a few weeks ago. Yum, yum.

In April, I celebrated my birthday along with my son-in-law Brad. I’m not going to post our ages. You can see the candles loud and clear.

We had the good fortune to attend an Angels game on our Birthday weekend. So of course we had to have this cake! It has a yummy whip cream frosting, so much better than buttercream anytime.

In May, we celebrated my Dad’s birthday with some no-bake cheesecake and berries. Quite a light summer dessert treat.

Evan gave his great-grandpa the sweetest, most heartfelt hug right before we sang. We all went, “Awwwwwwwwwww”.

I love this picture of my Dad singing to himself. We had a great day, lots of fun family times.

We are surrounded by an amazing family group. There’s just so much love, caring, and compassion. It’s the most comforting feeling to know that you can count on your family for anything. A rousing Happy Birthday to all of the family who have celebrated so far this year. As soon as my board is complete I will post an update on how it turns out.

Are there any new traditions started in your family this year?

p.s. photo credits in this post go to Elaine, Erica, and my Mom. Thanks ladies for making sure we don’t miss out on any great memories.

No comments Posted in Around the House, Family, Holidays

Does your family have any birthday traditions?

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Renee Spindle

I am a traditionalist. I love traditions, and creating memories for family members. There are a few birthday traditions that we have so much fun with I thought I should share them with you.

The traditions that go with the birthdays at our house are numerous and fun. We try to have a theme for the birthday parties, whether you are young or old. Iron Man, Batman, Transformers are some of the recent favorites. My oldest son works at Party City so we get great discounts on the party decorations. This makes for lots of fun decorating the house, which is at the top of my “I love to do this” list. We always hang up some sort of “Happy Birthday” banner. Last summer Evan and I made a pretty cool birthday banner that had lots of construction paper and glitter. We are still using this one for some of the birthday celebrations. Once in a while we get some funky birthday hats to wear. This is mostly for the girls in the family. Lots of fun to wear a crown and be the queen for the day. Oh wait that’s right I’m the queen of my house everyday!!!

Once our theme is in place then it’s just a matter of planning the menu. The birthday person gets to pick their favorite dinner, and what kind of cake they like. A few years ago we had quite a few “Taco Bar” birthdays right in a row. Everyone wanted tacos and nachos for their birthday dinner!!

For my own kids, I have always had some fun traditions. On your birthday morning we wake everyone up early to rush into the birthday boy or girls bedroom for a rousing wake you up rendition of “Happy Birthday to you”, sung as loud as we possibly can.

For a few years Travel Man and I would take all of our kids out on the birthday persons’ actual birthday, and then we came to our senses because it was getting way too expensive. After that we started taking out just the birthday honoree by themselves. That was a fun thing to do. It was great to get some alone time with just the birthday boy or girl.

On my kids’ sixteenth birthdays I gave each of them a journal, and in the first few pages of the journal I wrote my memories to them of the day they were born. I think this tradition started because the kids would always ask about the day they were born, either on or around their birthdays every year. I wanted them to have the memories to last a lifetime.

For the 21st birthdays I make a picture collage for the kids. This is a birth to adulthood collage, a wonderful walk down memory lane. And this year will mark my last collage, as Zach will be turning 21 in July. Oh boo!

We have so much fun when the whole family is together singing happy birthday at the Party House. First we sing a chorus of happy birthday, and there’s always some sort of harmonizing going on. Then we do a second verse where we sing like this;

Happy Birthday to you cha, cha, ca (with synchronized clapping)”, “Happy Birthday to you cha,cha, cha. Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday to you, cha, cha, cha! The cha, cha’s are always accompanied by hand clapping.

I have to check with my mom or my brother and find out how we started singing this way as I just don’t remember. We’ve been doing it this way since my kids were very young. It’s just so much fun. If you’re a newbie at one of our family birthday parties, when we start on the second chorus it’s definitely a surprise!!

Lot and lots of fun traditions can always be expected at the Party House. I have always loved starting up traditions new and old, and look forward to keeping them going strong. The traditions are a great thing to be able to share with your kids, and now the grandson too. And as any Mom would, I hope that the traditions that I have started with my kids are handed down for generations to come.