Cops, Zoo & a Rose - 205/365

Today started out interesting. 

I was getting ready for the day when I got a text from Rachel saying there were numerous cops and unmarked police cars at a house up the street. We were both thinking WTF!?! I hurried up and finished getting ready, so I could be a nosy neighbor and drive up around the bend, to see for myself! She said there were a ton and she wasn't kidding! It was kind of spooky. 

By this time, they were just standing in the driveway and some were laughing, so I figured the main part of whatever they were doing, was over. One officer happened to be digging in the trunk of his car, so I stopped and I asked, "May I ask you what is going on here?" He just smiled and replied, "Oh, we were just assisting the federal government with a search warrant." Alrighty then! I then asked, "so no one is dead or anything?" He just laughed and said "no, nothing like that." I still don't know what they did or what they were into, but it's not something you like to see in your neighborhood. They just moved in not too long ago. Oh well! 

 Once all the excitement was over, Nana, Reagan and I were off to the Cleveland Zoo to meet Adrienne, Nikki and the kids. We had a great time and the kids were well behaved. The girls all had on blending outfits from Gymboree's latest safari line. They looked adorable! 

We even took a little ride on the train! I had never done before, it was cute! 

After the zoo, we went over to the rainforest to have some lunch. We were all starving by this time. After lunch, Adrienne headed home and the rest of us just hung around chatting for a little bit. While us adults were chatting, we noticed that Ally and Reagan found Nikki's lip gloss and were giving each other "makeovers." It was too funny! They looked beautiful! 

Eventually, mom and I had to get on the road so we could get stuff ready for our dinner tonight. My mom and dad decided that they wanted to get Aunt Rose's, Youngstown family together for a Celebration of Life dinner. Aunt Rose lived in Florida and didn't want a big "to do". 

We had it at Tippy and had nearly 30 people. It was wonderful to see everyone and everyone was excited to be there! 

Everyone brought old pictures of Rose. We passed them around and shared our favorite stories. It was so fun to hear stories that we hadn't heard before. 

For the decorations, we did everything with Roses. The centerpieces were roses and then we attached a picture of Rose to a stick and popped them down in the center. 

Rose always had the perfect manicure, so we found nail polish called "Vintage Rose" and tied a small picture of her that showed off her nails, to the polish. We gave one to all the women. She loved playing cards, too, so everyone got a deck of cards. My mom even found tiny chocolates that were in tiny playing card card boxes. They were so cute! Reagan passed out all the goodies to everyone and did a great job! It was such a nice way for us all to take some time to honor our beloved Aunt Rose! 

 I have three photos for today, shown in order of the day... 

The first is the Federal Agent Raid

 The next is the kids at the zoo...

And finally,  a family photo at Rose's Celebration of Life Dinner...