Black Friday
November 28, 2008 by Vickie Elledge
I did not go shopping at 5:00 am, but I talked to Stephanie and Mike and they did. I can not even feature this but they said the Walmart/Sams parking lot was full and people were parking on the street outside the lot. Target had lines to check out winding to the back of the store to the toy isle. Unbelieveable. And I slept in this morning. See what I missed. ;-( Oh well Steph and Mike splurged at Starbuck.. hot chocolate and diet pepsi. Not sure I understand why to go that early for Starbucks, but they had fun.
I did get most of the rest of the decorating done for Christmas. The tree needs the ornaments and that is it. I did tell Brandon that when he comes back from Nebraska we can put the small tree up in the basement. Might finish up the inside tomorrow.
We had a nice Thanksgiving, pretty quiet. Lots of food, friends from church, and what family was in town. We did eat lots of turkey, pie, etc.
Well love to you all, I am going to go put a few ornaments on the tree.
Stephanie Murphy: Little Sis’
November 28, 2008 by RebeccaElledge.com
I can’t wait for the baby! Although it has been nice to have a Designated Driver, it will be great to have the old Rebecca back! 
Have not been here for awhile
November 19, 2008 by Vickie Elledge
I guess I have not made a post in a while. Steve seems to keep updated here as well as does Stephanie and Courtney occasionally. Hey Court.. I miss you guys. I was sad when I did not get to go down there last week. I will be there soon.. Promise. Ryan updates his page daily or so. Guess it is my turn tonight.
Congrats to Mike. He has been at Wyoming Machinery a year already. Had his one year evaluation today and it seems he has done a good job for his employer this last year. He seems to like it there really well.
Dad went to the doctor today, a few changes made there.. He is no longer taking one of the meds they put him on a while back. He seemed to be dizzy and unsure on his feet, so they took him off for at least trial basis of another few weeks. He allowed me to bring the Christmas Village to our house this year and we are really enjoying having it here. Such a beautiful collection, such a beautiful reminder of mom and how much she loved this time of the year.. I know I still miss her greatly.
One of the ladies in my Bible study today issued a challenge to all of us in our class. It was an interesting one… She told us of this study she is doing called fasting from negativity. We were all challenged to the next 40 days to have positive thoughts, make positive statements, nothing negative. Have you ever realized how hurtful being negative can be? I am accepting her challenge for myself. Most of the time I know I say something negative without even thinking about it.. I think as parents, positive statements made to our children and grandchildren instead of cutting them down or being negative about what is going on certainly would be a way to up their self esteem. To my friends and family, my early Christmas gift to each of you is for me to be positive in everything I think and say… to make an effort to lift you up instead of being negative. Hope you all will try it also.
Well on a positive note… Good night, love you all, and have a great night…
The mom
Happy Birthday, Big Sis!
September 17, 2008 by Ryan Elledge
I am so fortunate to have an awesome family… a close family. And today, I get the privlege of wishing by oldest sister, Stephanie, a very happy birthday! I am so proud of her and all of her accomplishments, her giving spirit, her devotion to family and education… I know her students are luck to have her, just as all of us in our family are. Happy Birthday, Steph! Love ya.
Happy Birthday to Stephanie
September 17, 2008 by Vickie Elledge
Do you feel older today dear daughter? Well I do when I think about you being another year older. Hope you have had a nice day. Sorry you did not make your millions in Deadwood, but glad that you had a good time. I never made millions in Deadwood either, and havent at any of the casinos. Maybe we had better find a different way to make our millions.
See you at football tonight.
Love
The Mom
So Much To Say
September 7, 2008 by Ryan Elledge
But, I just can’ say it yet. So, I will keep some of it to myself at this time. But I can say, the next week is going to be interesting and I have no idea where things will end up for me. Time will tell.
Ok, so it has been awhile since I’ve really posted much of anything. Let me start with some politics. My initial reaction to Senator John McCain picking Sarah Palin as his running mate was, “Are you kidding me?” I, along with most Americans outside of the Great State of Alaska, have never even heard of this lady. I happened to be on a Frontier Airlines flight from Denver to Seattle when he made the announcement. Fortunately, Frontier has DirectTV so I was able to watch. While my mood was slightly hindered by the plane full of Obama supporters (this was the morning after the Democratic Emmy Awards, er, Democratic Nomination Convention), I was anxious to hear this lady speak. And when she did speak, I was impressed. So was Mr. Democrat sitting next to me (yes, he was complaining about how many houses McCain has and how he merely married for money — we almost had to be seperated by the flight attendant). He actually said after her speech that he is afraid….
Fast forward to the RNC and listening to her speak again, I think he SHOULD be afraid. This lady is good. She has energized the Republican party. And, I didn’t think that could happen this year. All I can say after listening to her, Rudy, and Huckabee is “Game On!” We do have a long way to go, and I am anxious to see her unscripted… but I bet she’s good.
The Mom and The Dad came out here and visited for a week, and it was great to see them. They arrived on Saturday and went with Rebecca to her parents house to celebrate Spencer’s Big 15 Birthday. Speaking of Spencer, I uploaded some pictures of him tonight that I took on his first day of high school — yep, Spencer is a Freshman at Blue Valley North West High School — he’s a Husky! Anyway, back to the ‘rents. I was gone to the Gorge for DMB when they arrived, so I didn’t see them until Monday night. On Tuesday, we did a down-and-back trip to the Lake of the Ozarks and took them out on the boat. They enjoyed that, as did I. Sad to think that my boating season is basically over… yet the payments continue year-round.
Mom and Dad took off back to Casper on Saturday and made it back late Saturday night. I am thankful they came out and got to spend some time with Lil Braelyn and Hoover. They threatened to take both of them back to Casper… I didn’t let ‘em. They are going to watch Braelyn for a week in October when Rebecca and I venture back to Maui with Gabe and Stephanie. I can’t wait for that trip to come.
Uploaded some pictures of Lil B wearing her Denver Broncos cheerleading outfit to my gallery. Even though the Broncos didn’t play today (they play the Monday Night Football game tomorrow against the hated Raiders), it was fitting for her to wear the orange and blue on opening football day. She looked adorable… judge for yourself by checking out her photos.
Yesterday, I went and watched Brock play his first football game. He made a nice tackle on defense, and a few on offense, too. Ok, so his grandma called it blocking… but while on offense he ran out, found a defensive player, wrapped him up and tackled him… on several consecutive plays. No flags were thrown, though! Was quite cute. Uploaded some pics from the game in the gallery.
Well, Rebecca just got home from a walk, so I guess I will wrap this blog for now. More on what’s to come later this week.
Peace, ya’ll. And vote for the old guy and Sarah for Pres/VP…. we can’t afford not to.
–RE
The Big 80-90
August 7, 2008 by Ryan Elledge
Hard to believe, really, but within a two week span, my grandfather (mom’s dad) turned 80 and in less than two days now, my grandma (dad’s mom) turns 90. Last week, Rebecca, Spencer, Lil B and I traveled to Casper (plane to Denver, rental car to Casper) to celebrate the two huge milestones. Sitting here at 36 years old, I can’t imagine what it would be like to be 80 or even 90 years old. Both grandma and grandpa are in good health, though grandma suffers from arthritis which landed her in the hospital for over a week and my grandpa is in the early, but apparently progressing rapidly, stages of alzheimer’s. Grandma isn’t moving around too well, though better than I figured she would. And grandpa goes “distant” on us, but to me, he does a good job of being on top of things.
We were fortunate enough to see, and introduce Braelyn to, a large number of my family members. We saw my mom’s aunt Betty, my uncle Randay (whom I haven’t seen in I don’t know how many years), my cousins Jamie and Chris (Randy’s daughter and son), Tom and Janice (kinda like aunt/uncle, but not really), my cousin Heather and her husband Dale along with their kids Christian and Justin, my aunt and uncle Fred and Lynda (Lynda is my mom’s sister), my cousin Jason and his wife Dawne, along with Madison (daughter) and newborn Luke (one month younger than Braelyn), plus my absent cousin Josh’s daughter Karleigh (doubt I spelled that right). Also saw my dad’s cousin Mike Elledge and wife Judy, friend and baseball teammate from way back Tony Cerullo (who’s grandma Betty lives with my grandpa now). Tony’s wife, their kids, Tony’s brother Adam, and parents including Geno whom I haven’t seen in forever. Of course, my sisters Wendy and Stephanie were both there, along with their spouses (Tony and Mike) and kids (Brandon, Nate, Courtney, Keegan from the Lecher side and Ashley and Stevie from Steph’s side). Yep, mom and dad were there, of course, as well as probably a ton of people I can’t remember right now as I type this. Tried to list as many names as I could to give some shout-outs to the family who may see this. If I left you off, let me know and I will edit and add ya, since it was purely accidental. Missed seeing, only by a day, my cousin Heidi and her kids as well as her brother (thus also my cousin) Paul. They showed up to spend some time with grandma.
Whew. Lot of family. Funny thing is at any given time, nearly all of the above were over at my parents’ house! In fact, the ‘rents parked their RV (aren’t you glad you still have it, mom?) in their back yard (redneck city!) and Heather, Dale and the boys stayed in it. Had a great time visiting and relaxing with the family. Spent a lot of time listening to Mike Elledge and Fred play the guitar every night, which ultimately broke out into song and all. Also spent a tremendous amount of time playing on Fred’s Martin Backpack guitar. Small and weird to play, but I really enjoyed it. So much so that I went to Guitar Center yesterday to get me one… but they were sold out. Oh well, maybe someday soon. Christian, who is 14 years old, and I spent a lot of time on it. Thanks to him for teaching me some things (Fred, too). We learned Jason Mraz’s I’m Yours song and Dueling Banjos from the movie Deliverance. Also learned Blackbird by the Beatles (I think) but known more to me as Dave Matthews covers it frequently. Probably spent more time hammering away on the guitar with Christian than I have in months! I am definitely reenergized from a guitar perspective. Christian, who I must say is an awesome kid, has been playing less time than me but has progressed much faster. I think it’s because he spends far more time on it than I am able to, plus he works it not only in school but often with Fred. If I had someone to “jam” (I can hardly jam) with, no doubt I would spend more time on it. Once a week with lessons (less frequent now since Scott, my instructor, is out-of-town getting married and honey-mooning) just doesn’t get me where I would love to be.
Anyway, some great hilights from the trip include:
- Seeing grandpa sing some karaoke at the bowling alley
- Two trips up to the cabin… sorry grandma didn’t make it
- Seeing grandma, at almost 90, hang till past midnight on two nights!
- Seeing my oldest sister, Stephanie, really enjoying life
- Seeing both of my sisters really get along (not that they don’t often, but they really seemed to have a good time together)
- Watching my nieces fight over holding Lil’ B
- Seeing the basement at mom & dad’s prepped for Big B to move in in less than a month while he goes to Casper College (aka Harvard on the Hill)
- Seeing my nephew Nathan really coming into his own and getting the crowd roarin’ with Karaoke — quite the country singer he is!
- Seeing nephew Keegan really growing up and becoming yet another awesome kid!
- Watching nephew Stevie take to the guitar, along with karate chopping me a bit here and there
- Seeing just how grown up my niece Ashley has become — oh, and watching her and Spencer pretend not to like each other!
- Throwing down a bunch of Fat Tire with the family (sorry Christian, you just aren’t old enough yet!)
- Witnessing my dad (and I) exercise extreme patience (not kiddin’) with all of the commotion
- Witnessing my mom, as usual, being so dedicated to her family
There was so much more to the weekend, but that is a short list of the hilights. All-in-all, it was great to see the family. It was like two family reunions combined into one. Just sorry I didn’t get to see Ron, Shelli, Paul, Heidi and kids, and Josh. Maybe at 90 & 100 I guess!
Well, Rebecca is at the gym playing raquetball with Holly (Rebecca’s first time ever) then doing some running and whatnot. Braelyn is up in bed (gonna go check on her now), Hoover is laying by my desk (surprise, surprise) and Spencer is over at a friend’s house for the night (surprise, surprise…. wonder what mischief they are up to tonight). Guess I’m gonna go relax a bit and watch the boob tube and fall asleep. Just had a few moments so thought I would blog about the last weekend. I think I have about 545 pictures almost finished uploading in the gallery (Under PLACES > CASPER > AUGUST 2008). Thankfully I didn’t take so many the camera would break, but I came close!
Cya for now,
RE
**NO BO** — **GO USA**
Oh yeah, poker on Saturday night. C’mon over!
Okay …. we did it again …….but not for awhile.
July 21, 2008 by admin
Okay – In one of our weaker moments Vickie and i booked another cruise! It’s a happy 64th birthday to me! It won’t be until the week of October 18th, 2009. 1.25 years to get ready …. but it is on the calendar. Should give anyone with interest plenty of time to figure it out if they would like to join us. I know it is a dirty deal because it is probably right in the middle of a school year but hey …. everyone has different school years anyway and the only way to work around them would be to do a summer cruise …then we would hit baseball, softball, lakes, and a multitude of different activities sooooooo —- it is October 18, 2009. 8 days on the Carnival Spirit —– departs San Diego and ports in Acupulco, Manzanillo, and Ixtapa – all in Southern Mexico – south of Cabo & the ones we have been to before. All new ports for us so looked exciting – and 2 sea days on each end – 2 to get there and 2 to get back. Anyone who can work it out would be more than welcome……we would love the company. Vickie just advised me it is only 453 days away as of today.
While I am on cruises – let me just make it perfectly clear that we are open minded – and if another sweet lookin’ deal comes up prior to October 2009 we could probably be talked into taking a serious look at that also. Notice i said also – i have every intention of making this ship - already have a room reserved (a suite no less)! I figure if i start paying on it now it should be good to go by departure eh! Anyway – keep us posted if you have anything cooking that we might be able to join you. I am already ready. WOW — I will turn 64 on that one – sheesh!
Hot here today. We had a little bbq here for about 18 people this evening. It went well – had venison hamburgers though – not bad but not my favorite.
Mom still at the hospital. Sounds like she will spend most of this week there while they figure out what she is capable of doing for herself and what she needs help with. Don’t think it will ever be quite the same again but Mom always surprises me so will withold judgement. Just seems like this pain is intense and hurts her even while she is on some pretty stout painkiller. Pray for comfort please.
Stephanie – whenever I had the honor (seldom because I was a good dodger) of buying you or your sister "plugs" I never felt the urge to broadcast it —— so thanks for letting anyone with internet access know i was buying nylon panties on the weekend – pink and blue and white by the way. Anyway – as Larry the Cable Guy would say — I got ‘er done! 
Going to bed now —— dont forget to use BO-derant!
The DAD
Weekend Update
July 20, 2008 by admin
So, the weekend is nearly over, but in about 15 minutes, Rebecca and I are headed out. We’re going to an OAR (Of A Revolution) concert at Sandstone. Concert begins at 7:30 pm tonight, but the idiots running Sandstone have removed a bunch of seats and made it all general admission. So we have to head out in the blistering sun (as if I haven’t had enough of that this weekend) and try to get a decent spot to watch the concert.
We got back from the lake about 2 hours ago. We had a good time. Spencer and his friend Philip went along with our friends Shawn and Stephanie Hashmi. The Murphys couldn’t go this weekend as they have the Murphy family reunion today over at Gabe’s house.
Well, a short update, but we are about to head out the door and I need to finish getting ready. I’ll have some extreme tubing videos uploaded this week (I hope, heading to Omaha Tuesday for a DMB concert)… Rebecca, Philip and Shawn had some nice “spills”. I’m a good driver! Spencer wussed out and didn’t tube at all. In fact, short of a 20 minute jet ski ride, he may as well not even have gone to the lake. We did catch the new Batman movie late last night. Two thumbs up, for sure. Heath Leger was awesome as the Joker. Too bad he went and died before he could receive his accolades for making the movie a big hit.
Prayers to grandma, hope she gets out of the hospital soon.
Peace. I just took a shower, so I have no BO. I hope you don’t have BO either.
–RE
It’s Raining, It’s Pouring
July 12, 2008 by admin
Hoover is beside me, snoring. How clever.
Yep, it’s a rainy morning here in the OP. Wouldn’t you figure? I have absolutely no plans this weekend other than just relaxing and goofing around the house. Rebecca just went to Sam’s Club to get some necessities (like AA batteries, since we are out and it is hard for Spencer and I to play Rainbow 6 on the XBOX 360 when the controllers keep shutting down). I hope it isn’t supposed to rain all day, though it is not like I plan to be outside much or at all.
Braelyn is upstairs in bed, taking her mid morning nap. She didn’t sleep very well last night which is weird because she was tired last night when we put her into bed. We had the Beckners over last night. Erin and Sean brought Lincoln Cade over. He turns one year old in just under two weeks now. He is a cute “little” kid, though I think I saw him making some moves on Lil’ B. It’s amazing how young a kid’s hormones kick in! Lincoln’s going for the younger woman. What really is amazing is to see the things Braelyn will be doing in her next half year. Lincoln eats regular food (he enjoyed one of my hamburgers cut up into small pieces), walks around, tries to get into Hoover’s water bowl, acts like he’s going to throw his sippie cup, and talks a lot. Not real words, mind you, but he does have the “ma” down pretty well. I still am not over him slapping Braelyn’s butt. Actually, he didn’t do that, but he did decide it would be fun to sit in her lap.
The Murphy’s are down at the lake with Stephanie’s family. Hopefully they don’t get the rain we are getting. Gabe called a little while ago to have me tell him how to run my boat and he said it was a bit overcast but not raining. Would suck if they can’t spend much time on the water because of the rain. I think I am heading down to the lake next weekend with a few friends. Will be my last weekened down there for awhile, as Rebecca has my following weekend planned out for me, and then we’re off to Casper the weekend after for some birthday celebrations of my Grandpa (80) and my Grandma (90). Should be a good time. Then, August has quite a few DMB concerts, so who knows how many more trips I will have to the lake this year. Sad, really… summer goes by pretty quick. And then we’ll be in the winter months once again, where we write a big check every month to pay for a boat that we can’t ride. Yeah.
Received a text message last night from my mom. Her week+ venture to California came to conclusion as she arrived back in the big city of Casper last night. She went out there with my sister Stephanie and my niece Ashley and nephew Stephen. Ashley had a dance competition out there, and they all had the opportunity to take in some Disneyland and attend my aunt’s 60th birthday party.
Uploaded a ton of pictures last night; some of Braelyn, some of Hoover, some of the Murphys and pool play, some of the Lake, and some professional pictures taken yesterday of Braelyn and Spencer.
Now, back to cleaning the virus off my computer. I messed it up real bad yesterday trying to break some encryption on some pictures. I knew better. Oh well, gives me something to do this rainy day of July.
Oh man, I need to go put some deodorant on to make sure I don’t have any BO. You should put some on, too, to keep the BO out of the white house.
-Peace
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