the one about my Holly-day

So, I am official. I am a substitute teacher. Cool huh. I got my "Welcome to the School District" letter today. I can start as soon as I get a call. I am so excited!

Today, I had such a great day with my dear friend Holly. About a week ago, she asked me to help her make a baby quilt for her new baby niece. Her name is Sydney and she is quite a little miracle. She was born 3 months early (on September 27th and wasn't due until January 27th) and is doing surprisingly well. Holly found some cute material and asked if I could machine quilt it for her if she put it all together. Well, I love machine quilting, so I was super excited. My friend Robyn has a quilting machine, so we went to her new house and quilted. I got Quayd off to school and then Holly came to pick me up. Holly, Spencer and baby Jacob came along too. Robyn is so sweet and a total blast to be with so I was glad to hang out with her. I need to get my butt sewing again and go play with her. Anyway, after we sewed, she brought me home. We sat in my driveway and visited for awhile. I looked at the clock and saw that is was time to get Quayd so I asked her to take me to the school so we could get him and still visit. Then we decided that we hadn't had enough of each other so we went to lunch. We talked and talked and talked and talked and talked and talked and talked and talked and talked. It was GREAT! Once we left lunch, we ran a little Christmas shopping errand then she brought me home. Baby Jake was hungry, Holly needed to potty and Quayd and Spencer were having fun playing, so she came in for awhile. We talked and talked some more while Jake had a bottle.

Holly is such a special friend to me and I appreciate her more than she will ever know. She is a wonderful example to me. She is a great listener and I love hanging out with her. We haven't seen much of each other for awhile, just busy lives I guess, but I really miss her. She has four great kids and Spencer is my little buddy. He yelled "Hi Mandy!" in sacrament meeting yesterday because he was so excited to see me. I don't think he stopped talking to me this whole day. He told me knock-knock jokes, all kinds of stories, songs and he told me how he kissed Baby Jake in the library. He was so much fun. I think he was about to drive Holly nuts, but I loved it. When Holly was running her errand, I stayed in the car with the kids so she wouldn't have to haul them in. Jake started to cry and I asked Quayd to look in Jake's carseat for a binky. Quayd found it and put it in his mouth. He stopped crying and Quayd was so proud of himself for helping the baby. Of course, Jacob started to cry again, so when the binky wouldn't work, Quayd talked to him, played peek-a-boo, touched him and danced for him. It was so cute. I hope he grows up to love babies and kids as much as I do! Holly is going out of town for a couple of days and I get to help her with Scott a little. He is such a good boy and I am glad he and Quayd are friends. And I am glad that Holly and I are friends too!

Speaking of friends, I went with Holly, Kandice and Janice to BINGO Saturday night. Brett, Gleneita, Talia and Kandice's mom Julie came too. We had a blast. Seriously, it was so much fun. My only wish is that I could have looked a little bit more stupid in this picture. I don't know what is wrong with me that I take such a bad picture lately. Or maybe I am just realizing what a dog I really am. Interesting. Janice won Bingo once, and almost another time! Right, Janni? ;) and Brett and I won a turkey in the turkey raffle. But that was our only winnings. It was still fun though. Brett, Gleneita and I go every year. And we always see Tara and usually sit by her. It was no different this year. She was there with Shae, the spaz that broke her collar bone playing football with some friends. Not cute BOY friends though. (Duh, Shae!) We have so much fun every year, and one thing is for sure, we NEVER EVER win!!!