missed headlines

What a weird week. I can't say that I'm sad to see it end, though I am looking forward to today so much. I'm so glad the comments on the photos from my last post were seen as being happy because that's exactly what it felt like....happy and joyful. And then something happened. Perhaps it was the full moon, I don't know, but my emotions heightened and I had a few rough, what I like to term, crazy days that followed. Oh wretched hormones please pass quickly...

I was busy which was one of the reasons why I didn't blog and was staying off the internet, but my state of mind led me to believe it was the best thing for everyone. So here are a few of this weeks highlights I think I would have posted about had I had my wits about me:

01. saturday morning


This is what I woke up to last Saturday morning. The four of them singing along to some song on the internet. They were so content in the moment being together I just took a picture and left them to their business and headed back to bed to read. Not a bad start to the day. Today Jill is waking up to my girls and I hope she is given the same amount of peace, though I have a feeling there has already been a lot of asking for food.

02. game night


And I can't talk about the girls having a sleepover without mentioning the reason it came about in the first place. After what seemed like all summer long we are back...game nights have resumed. I didn't realize how much I missed our nights together, laughing, bantering back and forth, winning or loosing in my case until we started up again. Plus it's fun to see how excited the girls are when they know their going to hang out with cousins.

03. smell of rain


It rained this week. A most delicious rain. Megan had a friend over at the time and they went outside to play in it. As I heard their giggles and ran to get my camera I heard Meg say to her friend, "I love the smell of rain it's so...fresh."

04. create wednesday | week 2


My friend Amy called me Thursday and the first thing out of her mouth was, "what did you do for creative wednesday?" It took me a moment to compose myself thinking, oh man did i do something... I was happy to report that I did, in fact, use my time being creative. I made another pair of earrings for my giveaway, I made 1 earring from 2 different earring sets (couldn't decide which one I liked better), I made raspberry freezer jam, and re-covered two long over do chairs. I still have two to go, but I ran out of staples. It's good to know that someone is keeping me accountable for my time, thanks Amy. Did you do something creative this week?

Have a great Saturday!
xo, amy

tuesday randoms

*It's not quite 7pm, but I'm already in my pjs ready to curl up with a good book and say good bye to this day. Not that is hasn't been a good one, quite the contrary, but even a good day can be an exhausting one.
*I think I'm extra giddy that I don't have anything going on tonight. Literally I think this was the first night we ate as a family in like two weeks. Honestly, I can't remember the last dinner I just made for the 5 of us.
*I've been needing to make banana bread for several days now. I keep looking at the pile of withering bananas wondering if they will hold off for another day.
*Don't fall asleep while reading a hard cover book. I found out the hard way last night when the book fell on my face and the dust jacket cut my face. Ya, seriously.
*Week 5 of P90X is underway. It sucks.
*The nest outside my window is empty now. I'm sad they moved on.
*Just asked Megan where Bella was and she said, "she's downstairs watching Nova...about dreams. It's a boring show."
*Went to Sephora for the first time last night while out with Adam's mom and sisters to celebrate my MIL birthday. Never really understood the allure until I went and saw that they carried Fresh products (love their sugar line). Now I'm happy they came to town.
*Speaking of being at the mall...we got lock in the mall last night with a bunch of other people. What? Seems like a serious hazard.


*I had a babysitter today for a few hours which turned into a neighborhood water balloon fight. Good times.

she came from us...

Ray LaMontagne started playing as we were finishing up the dinner dishes. Adam and I sort of bumped into each other and spontaneously started dancing as the girls laughing, ran around the room. The noise in the distance faded and all that was left was us, enjoying the touch, the calm of the moment after such a busy day.



Then Megan ran by us throwing out nonsense words and as the screen door shut behind her she said, "Nice music, enjoy your love." And we couldn't contain ourselves any longer. She had broken the spell with her witty words and we laughed as we looked at her sly little smile coming through the grid of the screen.

He asked, "Where did she come from?"
"Us. She came from us." I reminded.

12of12 | February

[click here to enlarge]

01. Bella and Tess showing off their Valentine boxes. They were so excited to get to school for the party.
02. Playing around with an old Kodak camera. Photo of my studio.
03. Megan was making a scrapbook and I ended up having yellow hair. She told me it was because the brown was running out.
04. Flowers Adam gave me that I looked at everyday while I laid in bed.
05. The day started out cloudy and snowy, but in the end there was blue skies and around 47 degrees.
06. Bella is rushing to finishing Lightening Thief so she can see the movie that came out the 12th.
07. Love conversation hearts.
08. Quote of the day: Megan runs by me yelling, "Mom, we're playing dogs and I'm a black weiner dog. Have you seen my black shoes?"
09. When Adam got home from work I decided I just couldn't be home anymore, I'm going on 11 days, so we hopped in the car and headed to Jill and Randy's.
10. My friend stopped by Thursday for a short visit and gave me these roses.
11. It's me getting out. Everyday gets better and better. Of course Tylenol is helping.
12. The light show while heading home from our night out.

I hope it was another enjoyable experience capturing your day. I was a little afraid of facing the day not leaving the house, but you make do right, and well, I found a way to get out. Make sure to link your post, I want to see what the 12th looked like for you.

a conversation

I was gone and Bella & Tess had a sleepover with Whitney last night so it was just Megan and her dad for most of the day.

This was the story I heard when I got back.


[photo taken Sept 14 while Adam was home from work sick]

meg: said right when she woke up at 8:45am, "where's mom?"

adam: "she's at a church activity."

meg: "ahhh"

adam: "why do you like hanging out with mom so much and not with dad?"

meg: "because she's so smooth and you're so hairy."


while getting breakfast together

adam: "where am I so hairy?"

she stroked his arm

adam: would you love me more if I shaved my arms?

meg: definitely

anything but dull

She said out of the blue in the car Saturday afternoon, "I use to think babies popped out of your tummy, but now I know they come out of your china."

and then I found her like this, outside in her jammies drawing with her goggles on.



Never a dull moment with this girl around.

Anyway, naturally Megan's comment got me thinking about how and when to teach my girls about the birds and the bees as Bella and Tess both chimed in trying to correct Megan. Have any of you heard about these books? I have been told by a couple of friends that they're excellent, age appropriate, and a great way to venture into the subject. I keep waiting to talk with them about, you know, hoping they will ask (so then I will know they're ready), but no one has and I wonder if I should be the one to bring it up. I mean I know I should. Bella is going into fourth grade and I'm not quite sure what she knows from kids at school, but I know I want to be the one to tell her.

Anyway, just wondered who was dealing with this at home? If you've brought it up. Had the talk? How was it received?

wednesday outing

This morning Megan and I went on a little adventure to the tulip festival at thanksgiving point. I just felt like we needed to get out because who knows if we are going to be quarantined at some point. I've been feeling quite disconnected with the world so it helped feeling apart of it again.



Unfortunately Megan was in an foul mood, which meant no pictures of her except I still took them...candid ones.



Eventually I was able to get her to have fun with the chase and at one point she was saluting me when I would try to get a shot. What a punk. This photo reminds me of the other day when I asked her to try some yummy granola that I had made and she said, "I'm not going to fall for that."



I did manage to capture her in a rare moment peeking out of the secret garden. I was actually setting up to take this picture and she walked into it.



Even though we didn't stay long, I had to get Megan to school, what more can I say than it was a fun outing. When we were driving back I wondered how different my life will be when I don't have my little sidekick around to hang out with. I wondered if I will take these adventures on my own. It certainly doesn't sounds as fun without her there to chase and cheer up.

a family portrait

[who knew we had a cat.]

the same girl that drew this family portrait also said this morning while trying to figure out what she wanted for breakfast, "Mom, I don't know what I want for breakfast, I just want it."

Poor megan unfortunately inherited my indecisiveness. Let's just hope she's got some of the good stuff too, to outweigh the bad.

today i...

- took Megan to the dentist to find out why her gums were swollen.
- forgot my sunglasses and was fighting the blaring sun the whole time.
- finished spending my itunes gift certificate from Christmas by buying Been a Long Day by Rosi Golan.
- took back a pair of boots I loved because the heel was too high. I towered over Adam and I just couldn't do it.
- got repeatedly hit in the head with a kitty balloon (can see in photo below) Megan got at the dentist.
- helped Megan sort through a box of clothes.
- was asked to do a photoshoot for a ballerina.
- left the house with frosted flakes crushed on the kitchen floor.
- spent a few minutes vacuuming up said flakes when I finally got home from all my errands.
- bumped into my friend Dani at Taipan, a home decor store I claim to never go in because it makes me so uncomfortable (I'm so bad at home decor). I was there looking for a cheep serving platter and yes, I was dying to leave.
- had lunch with Megan.
- hit myself in the head with the visor because I thought it was attached when I went to lift it up. It hurt.



- Megan declared, "I'm in paradise" while sitting on pillows in a target shopping cart.
- finished The Reader and this quote really stood out to me, "the truth in what one says lies in what on does." So so true.
- made a delicious pesto pasta for dinner.
- was asked by my friend to watch her three kids (ages 7,4,2) for 2 days at the end of the month. I'm really glad she asked because she doesn't get a lot of family help.
- heard Bella practicing her violin without any reminders from me.



- took this picture (above)
- had a big handful of chocolate covered pretzels and felt guilty about the 3rd and 4th handful.
- sat and held Tess while she had an emotional cry. Between her and Megan we are in big trouble when actual hormones hit.
- after the cry we read Judy Moody & Stink: The Holly Joliday by Megan McDonald together.



- finally finished this layout I started in November for the Design Your Life class. I'll have to share what I've done so far, but I stopped working on them at week 7 because I was working on Christmas gifts.
- read scriptures with my girls.
- saw a mouse in my backyard running on the snow. Yikes!
- watched Rules of Engagement Adam rented at Netflix.
- set my tivo to record 24 this coming Sunday.
- wrote in my journal
- got a babysitter for tomorrow night.

her show

Adam and I were talking the other night about how we don't have many videos of our kids. We are actually quite disappointed we've missed so many great opportunities to capture them with their funny sayings and personalities. Well, there's no time like the present to get started, after all they are still young. So Thursday while Megan and I played go fish or rather "gold fish" as she likes to call it, she was cracking me up by saying things like "hideous" that I pulled out my Nikon coolpix with the video option and captured the video below. I hesitate to share it because I know I think it's hilarious because she's my child, however, I do realize it may not be funny to anyone else....though by watching it you now may understand what I mean when I talk about her way. Yes, I thought the video was funny, but it was more the way she reacted to it that cracked me up.


[ps this is probably our 8th game of the morning, but our 100th game of the week.]

She loves this video. Loves it. I was working on some tags yesterday and she sat in front of the computer and replayed it over and over. She kept saying, "I want to watch my show". I think we listened to it at least 20 times while she sat there.



It was cute to see her giggling about stuff she would say and it made me happy to think she will have this memory forever. It definitely made me see we have missed out by not pulling out our video camera. I've actually wanted a flip for a while now so maybe I'll invest in one soon.

P.S. After playing 'go fish' all week I have been dying for some new card games. Please share some that would be fun to play with only 2 people. We played war, but it wasn't as fun as I remember and now I wonder if we were doing something wrong.

simple joys

All of my girls have a special relationship with their dad. For that I am very grateful. I couldn't have picked a better father if I tried. He is a wonderful dad and the girls just adore him. They sing his praises when he comes home (so do I) and love spending any and all time with him. Funny thing...he loves it too.

This morning I caught Adam and Megan sharing a favorite breakfest together...yogurt parfait. She was in heaven saying "biiiite biiiite" every other second and he, well he just loved having her company.