April Birthday’s!

April is an awesome month to be born.

Ask me how I know.

Today is his birthday.

The big one.

He’s my brother.

He’s opinionated, stubborn, articulate, passionate.

Of all my siblings he reminds me most of me.

He’s a mason, and works long hard hours.

In the picture above he is with his youngest, for a few more months, Levi.

He (and Joanna, well, mostly Joanna) had 3 kids in 3 years.

I am proud of him.  He works hard and supports his family.

And if any of us need helps, he’s more than willing to lend a hand.

I love family gatherings when Matt is there…..

ALWAYS interesting conversation.

And he can swear in Portuguese.  F@#!.

And this person turned one year older this month.

She’s still waiting to grow up, though.

 

Two more April babies.

My MIL, the sweetest lady in the world.

She loves her family, works hard, and strives to do the best she can in every situation.

And my BIL, John.

John was born 6 days after me, exactly ten years before me.

This is a picture of him before his 42nd birthday.

He was in a motorcycle accident 3 years ago, and,

“Damned near died.” as he says.

He was in the Air Force, and worked in communications.  He served in Bosnia…

maybe other places, but that’s the place he talks about the most.

When John retired from the Armed Forces and first came back to this area we hung out a lot. He knows some of my secrets, and I know some of his.

On of the things that impressed me the most about him at that time was how honourable he was.

His wife wasn’t being the nicest to him, in fact was terrible.

But he would not let any one speak bad about her.

I called her a name once, and he said, “Whoa.  That’s my wife you’re talking about.  You don’t know her, or what she’s been through.”

And I thought at the time how any other man in the world would be saying the same thing I had, and welcoming any one else who would join in the opinion.

Instead, he insisted upon respect for someone who did not necessarily deserve it from him at that time.

Honour.

Doing the right thing even when nobody’s watching. 

Even when you don’t have to.

In April of, I’m gonna say ‘98, but I don’t remember details very well, we went riding for our birthdays.

He said he wanted to go, and I ALWAYS want to go, so we went.

He did okay.

I took it easy, so no stress.

He told me after that he loved it.

He astounds me with his will to survive.

And he still has his dirty sense of humour.

I tried to get some pictures when I was there last,

and was disappointed to find they were all crappy.

With that new photo editing software though, I was able to salvage a few.

I like this one.

I don’t talk about these guy’s much, and maybe some day I’ll explain why.

But I do love them.

At Christmas time.

One more April Birthday.

 

This picture proves what a terrible Aunt I am.

Why?

Because Wessy, or Wesley, Turned ONE!  His FIRST birthday was this month.  So, I went looking for a picture of him.

And this is all I found.

He’s nursing.

The one behind his father’s wine glass.

Poor, poor Wesley.

Bad, BAD Aunty Heather!!

I also attacked a couple other crappy photos, to see if I could fix them up.

I’m tired, and finished my glass of wine.

Good night.

And Happy Birthday! to those that deserve it.