The Fabulous B@ker Blog

Brothers My dad has been gone 10 years ago today. Time seems to go so much faster now that we are older, and the past 10 years went sooooo fast - it seems like yesterday. Back then, the kids lost all three grandfathers within three years: first was Grandpa Charlie in 2001, then my dad in 2003, then Daniel/Gung Gung in the summer of 2004 (I think it was). Lots of love lost. I'm sure all three men would have been super proud of their kids and grandkids. Add to that the loss of our beloved Uncles Joe and Duff - what a time they must be having in Heaven! I'm sure they are just waiting for all those women to join them ~ enjoy your time now, boys!  :) But, time marches on with the promise we will all be together again someday.

Annalisse's FHS graduation was June 20. Annalisse's grad party was July 20. One super, super busy month. A month that included the kids going to work at their camp jobs and our trip to LV, topped off by several days of intense prep and set up (which we could not have accomplished without the help of our awesome neighbor, Morey, and the fact that Mark was home on Thursday and Friday to get the outside ready) for an outdoor grad party on a day that called for rain. Whew. Well, the party was this past Saturday and everything was perfect! My trusty iPhone told me that the rain would clear by 1pm, just in time for the 2pm party start time. When it was still raining at 1pm I did not panic but remained faithful to my trusty Weather App. By 1:30 the skies had cleared and the sun was peaking out, so we got to work cleaning off tables and putting the table cloths on. All was ready to go by 2 and the party began! The appetizer table was set with Mom Shiao's much-missed homemade

Finally! I'm catching up on our trip to LasVegas. This will be a long post so I will report on Annalisse's awesome grad party in the next day or two. So let's begin...!! Mary, Nicole, Annalisse and I left for Las Vegas the morning of Wednesday, July 10 (which seriously seems so long ago even though it was only 11 days ago...), and arrived about an hours and a half later than planned, around 9:30 LV time, which was 12:30am NY time. So, we were a little whipped. We got settled into our room at the Mirage and promptly hit the sack. Then, the next morning I woke up early as usual (around 5am LV time, which was not too bad considering I'm usually awake around 3-4am until I begin to adjust to West Coast time), and we got the reluctant girls moving so we could see some sights before I had to report for my presentation around 2pm.  (You seriously would have thought they were vampires the way they screamed when I opened the blinds and let the sun in.)  For those readers who

(I know you may be expecting a recap of our Vega$ trip but I thought I would post pictures of the renovations, which I am super excited about, first. Check back!) They're here! Pictures of the house renovations that started in May. It's been a long haul but we are almost there. The only thing to be done is the painting of the porch stairs, which will need to happen when we are assured of a stretch of dry weather which is hard to come by in this wet, cold summer. We super happy with the results, although the original vision of the house color was a charcoal gray it ended up being a little bluer than planned (Cam calls it a giant blueberry). You just never know with paint! So, just in time for Annalisse's big party this weekend, here they are!   BEFORE AFTER

My butt is dragging after getting to bed after midnight last from our LV flight. Highlights later today (or tomorrow): Annalisse's "Trainer for a  Day" pix Pictures of Liberace's abandon home The kids at the Wax Museum In short, it was a really fun trip! [Now I will pay for the rest of the week...]

...the Baker kids, apparently. The revered chicken We picked the kids up from their camp job yesterday afternoon. Or, rather we picked up Annalisse; Cam went out to dinner with his camp pals. We waited a little while for them to finish their staff meeting, then out came Annalisse carrying this giant stuffed yellow chicken. It seems being awarded the chicken is a great honor. It was jointly given to Cam and Annalisse in acknowledgement of a great job done at camp for the past week. Annalisse: for working really well and being super creative with the "sprouts" (little kids/day campers) during an especially rainy week, and Cam: for dealing with some particularly difficult camper situations this week. It must have meant a lot to Cam because he asked, "are you going to write about it on your blog?" Well, if he mentions the blog you bet I am! So here it is! Chicken award duly noted.

Our main house projects are winding down with the painters diligently trying to get the house done despite dealing with buckets and buckets of rain just about every day. I think they were hoping to be done today, but that's not going to happen as it is raining once again. Yesterday was terrible with severe afternoon thunderstorms and flooding everywhere. The flooding and water levels are getting a little scary now, and the forecast on my iPhone shows rain straight through early next week. This will surely go down as another summer that wasn't. That, as you know, will make for a very long winter. I can't let my mind go there now...I will become too depressed if I do. I'm so excited to post house pictures. It is coming along so great and I'm hoping, with all this crazy weather, that after the painters are down the construction guys will get back here quickly to finish the sealing/varnishing of the porch decking and painting of the steps. It's a race to get it