Week in the life :: Tuesday

Day 2. 177 photos. And my birthday!! (not telling how old I am!)

7:15 kiddos awake! everybody is poopy. :-(

7:20 poop requires a bath!

9:00 Tuesday mornings are a crazy rush to get out the door to my bible study group. Kay C. takes care of kiddos while we ladies study. I love how much she loves our kids!

Bible study books

12:30 LeAnn comes by for a birthday lunch. What a great surprise!

1:30 finally getting Aaron down for a nap

1:40 and little missy needs another diaper change.

5:45 Daddy is home for some playtime! And he shows me how Susannah can sit by herself for a really short time. I had NO IDEA she could do this!!!

6:00 the boys disappeared upstairs for birthday gift wrapping, and Aaron makes a special project for me. Yes, it's wrapping paper with random cuts and bits of tape. But he's so proud to give it to me. I LOVE IT!

6:15 singing happy birthday to mama, and trying to keep Aaron from blowing out the candles

6:30 Chipoltle for dinner.

7:30 a post-dinner family walk. Aaron ran most of the time.

7:37 My absolute favorite picture of the day. :-)

8:15 home for present opening. I had a "helper."

8:18 Aaron took this one of us.

8:30 Getting ready for bed, and none too happy about it.

Grateful, blessed, loved.... all good words for today. Birthdays have a way of making me take stock, and when I look around, I just want to scream "I LOVE MY LIFE!" I love all it's messiness, the wonderful friends at church, the kid cuddles, the goofy little presents Aaron gives to me, the family time together, ALL OF IT! My heart is full after a wonderfully ordinary day. 

Week in the life :: Monday

I'm participating in the Week In The Life documentary project over at Ali Edward's. It's an attempt to capture the ordinary, everydayness of life, with a cool time capsule of a book as the finished product. I'll be posting some of my raw data this week, then some of the finished book pages next week (or as I get them done).

184. The number of photos I took on Monday. Sheesh. These are straight out of my camera, so there's a lot of cropping, color correcting, and choosing to do. That'll come next week...

7:30 Indoor baseball. Wearing his baseball jammies and Cubs hat, of course.

11:20 Susannah wakes up from her nap. "I'll get her" Aaron says. And he does.

11:45 "Can we play with ABC?" He means ET. And that firehat is getting a lot of wear these days.

12:00 Lunch. With lots of funny scrunchy faces.

2:30pm While Aaron naps and mama works, Susannah entertains herself.

4:00pm Trying to get ready to go to the store. "Where are your socks, Aaron?"

"These are my GLOVES!"

4:10 Finally  in the car. Here we come, Aldi!

5:20 Home from shopping. Aaron helps bring in the garbage cans.

6:50 Checking email with baby.

7:30 How else am I going to be in any of these photos? This was an outfit that I actally felt pretty good in. A welcome occurance.

7:45 Dad had stopped in for dinner between trips to Florida. So great to have him here!

8:00 past bedtime, but helping mama make muffins for tomorrow's bible study.

A very good day, all in all! Though I'm trying to capture the routine of our life, I can already see that today was anything but. And when I think about it, lots of days are like this. We fudge nap and bed times, we have unexpected visitors, and make last-minute trips to the store. We're not organized at all, but somehow it all works.

Susannah update :: 4 months

Must hurry up and post this, since tomorrow she turns 5 months! Better late than never, right?

This fourth month brought such big changes in this little girl: she rolled over for the first time (and is now a champ at it), she started to giggle (mainly at Aaron's antics), and she's so much more interactive (with people, toys, etc.).  She's really becoming a little person now, and it's fun to watch this baby become.

Here are the official portraits:

journaling:
Four months old! It’s been a month of firsts for you: first giggles (music to my ears), first roll over from back to front (where you then get stuck and cry for help). You’re so perfectly round, so perfectly smiley, and just the best little thing to cuddle. {hug}

credits:
A Happy Heart by Cheeky Monkey

photography by Sharp Images (of course!)

Happy Easter (a week late!!)

Ugh.  My computer had a meltdown last week.  I should have known it wouldn't be a quick fix when the repair guy said "it should be a quick fix." It's been almost two weeks, and I'm still without my beloved laptop. The Photoshop withdrawal was getting pretty serious, so I broke down and downloaded PS onto Mike's little laptop.  That and a speed scrap made everything better! hehe. :-)

So FINALLY, I have some photos of our Easter to share with you.  Have you ever seen Aaron look cuter? He was so excited to dress up like Daddy. All morning he was shouting, "He is Risen" complete with a celebratory fist pump, as well as "Jesus is alive again!" It's so wonderful to hear your little ones proclaim the truth, isn't it?

journaling:

Little boys in collars and ties? Must be Easter! We sang and celebrated at Westminster Presbyterian Church in the morning, then joined the Anderson family at Claim Jumper restaurant for a delicious dinner (where someone else did the cooking and cleaning!).

credits:
template by Kellie Mize
paper from "For the Birds" by One Little Bird
fonts are Century Gothic and Elephant

journaling:

We don’t always plan ahead very well. It’s usually a mad dash out the door to church on Sunday mornings, family members in varying degrees of undress. We always manage to pull it togehter, but always at the very last minute. For Easter, I didn’t want things to be so haphazard, so I made a trip to the store, picked out new clothes for everyone, and even ironed the night before. When I saw this beautiful turqouise color, I just knew Aaron and Daddy would look wonderful in it, and that the two of you would get a kick out of your matching shirts.

credits:

template by the ever fabulous WM [squared]

papers and elements from "For the Birds" by One Little Bird

brown stitching from "Harvest Spice" by Shabby Princess

postmark by Katie Pertiet

fonts are CK Mini, CK Magnificent, and Trojan Pro

Thank you, BFF, for making me laugh today.

It's April Fool's! I had absolutely no intention of pulling any pranks today, but when one sprung to mind, I just couldn't resist.  Here's how it went down:

This i the email I sent to my DH today:

subject: wanted to tell you this earlier, but didn't know how..
i'm just in shock right now...

On a whim, I BCC'd my friend Rebo, thinking she'd get a kick out of it.  I sent her a second email moments later, letting her know that what I'd just sent was a joke.  But she didn't read that second one right away, since she was too busy picking her jaw up off the floor and emailing me back this message:

HOLY SH*T!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't call you right this minute, but I will SOON!!!!!!


Of course, she soon realized she had been pranked.  But by then we were both laughing.


Mike didn't fall for it for a second.  But I'm glad someone did! :-)

Six years ago today...

...it was another beautiful, sunny, Friday.  Despite the fact that it had snowed Monday through Thursday, I awoke that morning to blue skies and 65 degree temperatures.

...I wore the most beautiful dress ever, for a very special date with a very handsome man.

...we rode down Rt. 53 in a 1947 Mercedes, on our way to the biggest party we'd ever thrown. 

...we promised God and one another that we'd stick together for life, come what may.

It seems impossible that it's been six years already since that magic day, but I know we're only getting started. Some days are better than others, but, as one friend has said about us, we're climbing mountains together.

Thank you, Mike, for being the friend of my life. Happy Anniversary!

Our visit to the Shedd

Oh, our good friends, the Andersons! They have memberships to all kinds of wonderful places, and they always get the upgraded kind where you can bring friends. So lucky for us!!

Last Thursday 3/4 of our family piled into their van (sorry, Daddy, someone has to go to work!), and chugged downtown to see the "big fish." It's been more than 10 years since my last visit to the Aquarium, and so many great changes have taken place.  We saw old favorites like the giant Carribean Reef tank, complete with live diver, plus a lot of new things: the Beluga wales and their brand new baby calf; the multimedia show Fantasea, which featured dolphins, penguins, wales, and a flying boat; and the Polar play are, where Aaron dressed up like a little penguin and had a blast climbing up and sliding down the "rocks."

I actually remembered to pull my camera out of the bag and snap a few frames.  Here's the page that's going into our family scrapbook:

We'll definitely be making another visit sometime soon, and we all agree that next time we should bring our own "big fish" (aka Daddy :-)