Easter card!

I am not really one for sending out holiday-themed cards but when I found this adorable outfit at a consignment sale (and it was FREE!), I decided that I'd have to send one out this year for Easter. I also found bunny ear headbands at Target in the dollar section which sold me on the idea.

We did an in-home photo shoot this morning...now I just have to decide which picture to use. PLEASE help me by leaving a vote in the comment section. You should be able to see a larger version of the picture if you click on it. If you vote, I promise to send you a card (oooo incentive! ha!)

1 2 3

4 5

Also, please note that I was holding the camera with one hand while trying to get her to smile with the other so I wasn't able to center the photos as well as I'd hoped. Oh well!

Did I tell you that I love my baby jogger?

We ran to yet another park today because it was unbelievably summer-like outside (um...80 degrees anyone?). Baby C even sported a sundress!

Here is what motivates me in my baby jogger...quite the view:

I love my jogger!

New Babies!

Congratulations to the Millers!

Ryan Howard was born at 11:44 AM, weighing 4lbs 14oz

Alethea (Allie) Joy was born immediately after her brother, at 11:45 AM, weighing in at 4lbs 15oz

C and I also got to visit sweet new baby A today. She was born on Wednesday and is absolutely stunning, just like her mom! Here is the new family:

Congratulations to everybody!

7-months old!

Whoa. Baby C is now closer to being one than she is to being...zero...not quite the numeral term I was going for but it works.

Her big 7-month day started with church--bright and early for daylight saving's time! When I am in charge of the nursery, I bring her portable crib (made by Phil and Ted's) and try to get her to go to sleep. I know that Sunday naps are usually a wash but it is worth a try. This time I put some drapes I found in the closet over her crib. It worked--for about 20 minutes. I finally let her get out and "play" (aka, sit).

Then we went to Trader Joe's where C sampled the water:

***Reason 1001 why I LOVE TJ's--when asked how old she was by our checkout clerk, I replied, "she is 7-months old today". He promptly left his line and came back with a bouquet of roses! How sweet! LOVE TJ's.***

(Note: I wanted to snap a picture of the nice cashier who gave them to her but I thought that bordered a bit on the obsessive level so I passed. I did get one of her in the parking lot with her flowers, though)

After another nap attempt, C got to try more finger food--Tofu and Rice Cakes (also from the TJ--as we say it, phoenetically spelled the Teage)

Then J and I ran to the BIG park with the Baby Jogger (and of course, C. We would of looked ridiculous without her). It was hopping--crazy amount of people. We had to stand in line for C to use the baby swing! Good times.

We also celebrated Daylight Saving's Time by getting a free shot of espresso at Caribou Coffee--if you missed this incredibly nice offer, go there tomorrow--they are offering a free espresso shot all day Monday, too!

The twins are coming, the twins are coming!

I take great joy in writing that blog title.

#1, Kim's water broke today which means the twins should be here soonish!

#2, Lucas and Kim's twins made it to the 34-week mark which is pretty great, considering they first tried to meet their mom and dad when they were only 27 weeks old (correct me if I'm wrong here!)

#3, the Millers live in Boston, where the famous phrase, "The British are coming, the British are coming" originated. Which is why I found my title amusing and appropriate. Well, at least I can amuse myself. :)

Please check in on their blog for the most recent updates. Lucas promised that he'd be posting soon after they are born!

Mind your Millers

aww...blush...I've been tagged!

Special thanks to SJN, over at the Bridal Buzz blog for tagging me! She is the wonderful mom to Kristin, of the adorable custom-made onesie fame (see this post and this post), Kelly, who made my banner, and Alex (who is also great and creative!). Phew! That was a lot of links (if you clicked on even half, i'd be impressed!).

SJN was the mastermind behind Kelly and Kristin's weddings which both turned out absolutely gorgeous. She loved planning weddings so much that she decided to start her own wedding consultant business. SJN is even hosting her first giveaway so head on over and check it out!

Along with the award goes a "tag" of 7 things you love, and a "pass it on" to 7 blogs you love. So here are the 7 loves of my life:

1. My Savior, My God, My Father, My Friend, who saved me completely by His Grace alone--there is nothing I could do to ever earn his favor or my salvation--He bought me with his blood and I will love Him and serve Him!
2. J--my first boyfriend, first kiss, and last husband :) He is amazing and I'd be lost without him!
3. Baby C. I never knew love like this before!
4. My family. I have 3 living grandparents, amazing cousins, aunts and uncles, incredible in-laws and wonderful parents. But I have to highlight my twin, especially, who knows me inside and out and loves me anyway!
5. Running. Being able to go out and run through God's creation is such a wonderful feeling. It is often my escape and my way of thinking through issues!
6. Brownie mix batter--straight up, mixed with water, no eggs, oil, or baking. Just pure brownie batter goodness
7. Reading. I've always been an avid reader, loved Pizza Hut's BookIt! Program, always snuck a book into bed, and, even now, lose myself into a story and find it hard to come out of that book's world until I've finished it!
   

Now to pass on the Kreativ Blogger Award...gee this is hard! I have so many creative friends!

Here they are, in no order of importance or creativity:

1) Kristin of "The Newly Mrs. Morgan". She has always been creative--she came up with lots of our childhood crafts and ideas for playtime and now she is an incredible artist.

2) Kelly of "Hamilton Happenings". She made my blog header! How could she not be creative?

3) The twin of "Our Little Family of 3". She inspires me greatly with all the wonderful things that she makes for Little Miss, Baby C, and all of our friends' children

4) Natalie of "See Jane Scrapbook". She is about to become the mommy of (what will, undoubtedly be,) a beautiful baby girl. I can just imagine the creative things she'll make for her new little one!

5) Sisters Rebecca and Anjeanette their sister-in-law, Katrina of "Roots and Wings, Co.". They are amazingly creative and post tons of easy-to-follow tutorials.

6) Julia of http://juliaas.wordpress.com/. She makes great jewelery and blogs about Etsy giveaways!

and, finally,

7) follower, Jeanne, of Jeanne Louise Designs. She has an Etsy store and is also very crafty and creative!

There are so many more people that I really admire and think are incredibly creative but I wanted to give shout-outs to a lot of my followers! Thanks everyone and thanks, SJN!

If you've been tagged, please tag 7 more creative people that you know (or maybe do like SJN and just tag one! Come on, I know you know at least one!)

Don't forget to either e-mail your favorite bloggers or comment them to let them know they have won!

Attn: Tooth Fairy

We have a new tooth in the house!

C is too busy feeling the tip of her tooth with her fingers or her tongue to let me get a picture of it but she has finally cut her first tooth! I think it will pop all the way through anytime now. This tooth appearance might explain why she was so grumpy last week (see the grumpy picture in this post)!

Snaggletooth, here we come! Lets hope the second tooth will follow quickly!

And I think to myself...

...what a wonderful day

Today has been such a wonderful day and I just want to celebrate it! First, we've had spring, nearly summer-like weather and I've found that kind of weather always gives me an extra spring in my step. So, besides a slightly misty start, the weather set the precedent for the rest of the day.

Little Miss was celebrating her birthday with her friends today at the park. Check out the twin's post about the party.

Sadly, we could not attend as we had a prior commitment--volunteering at a local long-term homeless shelter with our community group. 4 other people besides me, J, and C came out to help organize and create mini-toiletry bags. It was a lot of fun to bond as a group and work for the betterment of our community.

My parents came down from the burbs after Little Miss' party and we all walked over to the park. They had never seen C in the baby swing before and she definitely put on a show--giggles, gurgles, and smiles abounded as soon as we strolled into the park.

Despite never sleeping more than 20 minutes today, C was in such an excellent mood! Her happy heart and cheerful disposition are so amazing--we are very thankful for them and for the great day we had today! Hope you had a wonderful Saturday, too!

PS Don't forget to turn your clocks back! Daylight's saving time starts at 2:00 AM!

Pre-weekend update

Wow! What a way to start the weekend. For me, Thursdays usually jump-start a 4-day weekend :) Why have a 5-day week when you can have a 4-day weekend? Ha!

J travels quite frequently, usually between Monday and Thursday. When he arrives home, it is like a nice long weekend. We usually go out to dinner on Thursday night at our local sports bar. We love it there. It is like our home-away-from-home. We even went there for Valentine's Day last year and it is where my labor started!

I digress.

Because they are the days that J comes home, Thursdays are usually my favorite. This week, though, we did not go to our sports bar...we went to celebrate Little Miss' birthday! It was so fun to celebrate her first year of life. We dressed the girls up and partied. Baby C wore an adorable dress given to her by Miss Caroline and Foofies before she was even born! Check out Little Miss' pictures on the twin's blog for more party pics.

Today, i was off and running to two of the biggest consignment sales in our town. I was in search of a smocked dress for C for Easter. My mom is the woman with the fashion sense in the family, so I took pictures of the dresses I found with my new toy and tried to send them over email. Sadly, the basements of churches don't work out too well in terms of wireless reception. I tried my best to describe them over the phone and came away with three. Thankfully, I also ran into one of the gals from my CBS study and she and her mom helped me narrow down the choices. Here is one from Strasburg Children that we scored for $15 (resell value is usually in the $50 range...)

Trouble with those consignment sales is that you cannot bring kids. Thankfully, J didn't have to be into the office until 11:30 so he was able to watch the sleepless wonder (aka Baby C) while I did some shopping. When I got home, C didn't look like she wanted to sleep so I fed her and decided to take her for a run in my "new" jogger. 8 miles and 3 stops later (post office, friends' house, and a store for a b-day present for Aunty M), C finally fell asleep. yay!

She was rested enough to do a quick, impromptu photo shoot. One wrinkled white fitted sheet and literally 100s of pictures later, we have a couple cute pics:

Back into the stroller went C around 4...this time for a "Swing Date" at our local park with another mom and baby. C LOVES swinging (I smell a review on park baby swings coming...) so this was a very happy ending to a long day for her.

I'm still waiting for my youtube video to load for the true ending to her day--attempting to feed herself broccoli. If it ever uploads, I'll post it soon!

FOUND IT! Poor thing, she is a little tired...



Have a great first weekend of March!

MVOTW, Psalm 27

Thanks to my new blog follower, Meghan, for mentioning my MVOTW (check out her cutely-named blog and encourage her to continue blogging!). I totally forgot to do one for this week!

I think I'd really like to memorize a whole Psalm, section by section. I chose Psalm 27 in the New King James version.

It is considered "a Psalm of fearless trust in God". I continually struggle to trust in God and rest in His plans. Instead, I place hope in myself and make my own plans without thinking about God's will. I'm also a worry-wort and fear a lot of things (will I ever get everything done that I need to get done? will I be able to have more children? will my children trust in God? etc. etc) I truly need this scripture to be written on my heart, that is for sure!

I'm going to start memorizing verses 1 and 2 which are bolded below. The whole Psalm 27 is listed, though, so that you can see it in its entirety. Anyone want to join me?

A Psalm of David.

¹ The LORD is my light and my salvation;
Whom shall I fear?
The LORD is the strength of my life;
Of whom shall I be afraid?
² When the wicked came against me
To eat up my flesh,
My enemies and foes,
They stumbled and fell.
³ Though an army may encamp against me,
My heart shall not fear;
Though war may rise against me,
In this I will be confident.

⁴ One thing I have desired of the LORD,
That will I seek:
That I may dwell in the house of the LORD
All the days of my life,
To behold the beauty of the LORD,
And to inquire in His temple.
⁵ For in the time of trouble
He shall hide me in His pavilion;
In the secret place of His tabernacle
He shall hide me;
He shall set me high upon a rock.

⁶ And now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me;
Therefore I will offer sacrifices of joy in His tabernacle;
I will sing, yes, I will sing praises to the LORD.

⁷ Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice!
Have mercy also upon me, and answer me.
⁸ When You said, “Seek My face,”
My heart said to You, “Your face, LORD, I will seek.”
⁹ Do not hide Your face from me;
Do not turn Your servant away in anger;
You have been my help;
Do not leave me nor forsake me,
O God of my salvation.
¹⁰ When my father and my mother forsake me,
Then the LORD will take care of me.

¹¹ Teach me Your way, O LORD,
And lead me in a smooth path, because of my enemies.
¹² Do not deliver me to the will of my adversaries;
For false witnesses have risen against me,
And such as breathe out violence.
¹³ I would have lost heart, unless I had believed
That I would see the goodness of the LORD
In the land of the living.

¹⁴ Wait on the LORD;
Be of good courage,
And He shall strengthen your heart;
Wait, I say, on the LORD!

Happy birthday to Little Miss!

I cannot believe Little Miss is ONE! Wow.

This time last year, I was teaching at a great Christian school. I really thought the twin would not have her baby until after school got out so I was just biding my time, waiting for updates, and trying to concentrate on teaching Latin! (If I recall correctly, we were reviewing for a test with Latin Jeopardy! Woo hoo always a fun time.)

The twin was induced and the doctors and nurses thought she'd be delivering by 3 PM--perfect timing for me to get out of school and to the hospital. Or so we all thought. Little Miss has been a mover and a shaker since before day 1 (you should see her moving in the belly) and she wasted NO TIME in coming into the world. I think the twin was in "real" labor for about 2.5 hours. Oh my that would be nice!

My dad called me during class to let me know that she was 10 CM and was going to start pushing. I started crying! I wasn't going to be there for the birth! Super sadness. Well, it just so happened that the school had arranged for a teaching candidate to come in and teach one of my classes (since I was just a long-term sub, they needed a full-time teacher for next year). That class, coupled with my class break and lunch, allotted me 2.5 hours of free time in the middle of the work day! God really worked that out for us and I was able to be with the twin a few minutes after delivering Little Miss. It was a great moment. Here we are a year ago:

J got to meet Little Miss the next day:

Click on this picture of Little Miss to see the twin's post on her birth(day)!

slow-to-post

I'm working on a b-day present for J and it is occupying all my time. Hope to be back in bloggy land soon! I miss it!

Once I get all the giveaway crafts finished, stay tuned for another giveaway...maybe featuring one of the crafty twin's crafts :)

Encourage my crafty friend

I love Etsy!

My friend, who made me those adorable onesies found in this post, is contemplating starting her own shop on Etsy! Please visit her blog and tell her that she should totally do it!

Recently...

Recently...in pictures:

C wears a shirt made by my crafty twin

and loves on her balloon from TJs (aka, Trader Joe's)

C matched J on their weekly daddy/daughter date (DDD):

white waffleweave, blue shortsleeve
(supposedly she was the talk of the coffee shop. J is making me include that lovely tidbit of info)

C accessorized with her new cloth diapers from Peas and Carrots

C kept me company during the long wait at the podiatrist's


C decides that growing teeth is hard work and leaves no room for smiling:

I took C to get her picture taken (back when she used to smile):


C jumped around in her cousin's jumperoo (MUST do a review on this toy!)

J faceplants C at Sweet Tomatoes:


And it snowed on our way home from church:

Flash from the Past

Wow. I was going through my yahoo account and cleaning up the emails when I came across an ancient message from The Knot. They wanted me to update my wedding webpage.

Check it out:

Wow. That is old.