Welcome to my blog!

My super awesome husband gave me a super fabulous camera a few years back and I've been hopelessly obsessed and have driven my children crazy with, "look at Mommy" and "you can have a piece of candy if you let me take 5 pictures", ever since. Here are just a few of those moments I steel away from my uber cute kiddos, and a few more moments I occasionaly get to take of other people...to the relief of my family. I do love to practice on anyone who will let me, so if you would like your picture taken let me know!
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Sunday, September 28, 2008

Back to Blogging

Our poor computer has once again tried to up and kick the bucket, but we refuse to let it go. I guess we're just not ready to say goodbye....or we just don't want to dish out the cash to upgrade. Nathan was able to do a little patching up - put in a new hard drive and some other fiddling around of sorts that I really don't understand. All I do know is he did something right. It's running a little smoother and I can once again get back to blogging. So lets see, what have we missed?

I believe I left off with my little brother Thomas having a birthday we were about to leave for. And what could be a better birthday dinner than a big bucket of fried chicken? I guess I don't actually like fried chicken all that much, but I am a huge fan of KFC's biscuits, so I was a happy girl. Plus it's a family tradition that goes back to my mom's parents - big family meal and no time to cook, just make a KFC run. And ice cream cake. I love the ice cream cake. We didn't have any candles that weren't scented and in a jar, but you've got to have something to wish on.


We did some lounging around on the couch...




...while Thomas sang some Beatles tunes for us.


Me.


One of our favorite things to do is to hang out around the fire pit in my parents back yard. Fall was in the air and it got really chilly that night, so the fire was extra nice. Here is the Birthday Boy.


I think M thought she could blow the fire out.


I made Nathan take actual pictures of me together with our kids.

J wasn't too thrilled to participate.

Look at M's funny face!


Nathan is never too excited to get his picture taken, but he puts up with me.


And he has figured out that if he is holding the camera I can't take pictures of him.

I stole Thomas' birthday present (the hoodie).

And a few more of my never still children.

All in all a very fun night. Happy Birthday Thomas! Lets do it again next year.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Happy Birthday

The baby of the family is working his way well into his 20's.

Happy Birthday Thomas!


Here he is about a year ago.


I'm off to get ready to head over for a birthday dinner and ice cream cake...

Monday, September 8, 2008

Sprinklers

We were going to take the kids to a friends house to go swimming in their pool, but time snuck by a little too fast and before we new it, it was close to bed time. So instead we turned on the sprinklers and let them run out the last of their boundless energy. We had been swimming the day before and one pair of J's swim trunks were in the wash, and the other seem to be growing to big for him and fell right off. I guess it's possible that J could have grown taller and thinner, but he was already so skinny I think the shorts grew. So I dug through his shorts drawer and pulled out the lightest feeling pair in there, but they must have grown too and were falling down. Poor guy. That put him in a funk and he ran in the water once, decided it was "cold and itchy" and pouted the rest of the time.


The last time we turned on the sprinklers for the kids M was scared of them. I don't know what changed between then and now, but she has changed her tune and LOVES them now.


She took a break to share her giddiness with us.








How she was able to drink like this and not get water up her nose, I know not.


In the mean time, J sat on the curb and wallowed in his sadness.


But M was still loving it.






By this time J started to realize that sprinklers could be just as much fun in regular shorts and was warming up to idea of having a little fun.




I love the light here.


And he's off!

Then Nathan went out for a dessert run and brought us home milk shakes which is, of course, the perfect end to the evening.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!

Every year in December I start to feel all Christmas-Crafty. But I'll let you in on a little secret...if you're only half crafty like me and can't seem to come up with any original ideas and need to buy the pre packaged crafts to scratch your itch, December is way too late to get started. Craft stores are down to bare bones by the time the actual holiday season has come around. So this year I am prepared. I shopped in August for my Christmas crafts. Yes, I said August. And yes, that's four months before Christmas. After all I do have kids old enough to be interested in this kind of thing and I have motherly obligations to fulfill this year and if I had waited any longer all the more organized and better planned moms would have beat me to the punch.

This year we started the Christmas-Craft season by making the decoration that must be seen on every Christmas Tree - Candy Canes. The beaded kind. I knew J would get a kick out of it, but I didn't realize how coordinated M would be. She'd load up her wire with beads in no time, and dump them back off even faster. Because it's not the destination, after all, it is the journey. Who needs a completed candy cane when you can watch the beads crash and roll all over your tray?

Here she is taking a break to comb her hair.




Still working on the hair...


He even crooked it himself. I am constantly astonished that my kids are getting older so fast and can do, and insist on doing so much more by themselves.


Our grand total for the day.


They stood in as make-shift Christmas trees just to test the decorations out.


M is convinced she is touching her nose with her tongue. And did you notice her shirt is inside out and backwards. Not only has she been doing her own hair, she's been dressing herself too.


He's always willing to give me a pose.




And I really like this star and am showing it to you for no good reason at all. Besides, stars go along with the Christmas theme, right?