Valentine's Day

 Amelia had a Valentin's Heart Craft party what was super fun. She had been looking forward to it since Christmas when I told her we could do one.

 We had a Valentine dinner with heart ravioli steak and asparagus. Michael got me some beautiful flowers too! Later that week I had a church activity where we shared what we had learned from Pinterst. I learned how to french braid Amelia's hair! She loves it, and it was super cute!

Amelia (Amelia just learned how to type her name :)

High School Friends!

My High School friends I love so much! What fun times we had! It was so much fun to catch up and to see what everyone is up to these days. We are hoping to get more people together next weekend so hopefully we have more pictures!! So thankful for my mom taking the picture so we could all be in it!

 

 

This is my friend Charissa and she came all the way from South Africa! Not just to see me :) But so thankful she came! It is great how even after not seeing each other for a few years that we can still connects and hangout as if no time had passed. Love you guys!!

A moment in a day :)

I have been meaning to take more pictures, so on this day near the end of January I grabbed the camera and snapped a moment of our day! Fun stamping with the kids, beautiful flowers from Michael and some yummy dinner cooking in the oven. It was a good day!

This is on a different day, but I had to take the picture. It is a Sunday afternoon when Amelia napped in her room, Daniel was being too loud so he had to come out and rest on the couch with his Dad. And this is how we found them when Amelia woke up from her nap. Too funny!! But it couldn't have been too comfortable! 

Amelia and Daniel's Special Day... and sickies

 My mom had been talking about taking Amelia on a special outing and so I planned to take Daniel on a special outing with me at the same time. Nana and Amelia went to the craft store and bought stuff to make a bird nest, eggs and a bird. They came back to the house with a whole family of birds, some fake grapes to feed them and paint to paint all the eggs different colors. They had a lot of fun. I had planned on talking Daniel to the flight museum that is near the library I take them to. I looked the internet to check hours, prices etc... well I guess I got the mailing address and not the museum's physical address, because we ended up at the airport and not the museum. I decided to just go to the library and follow the signs I always saw, when I got there they were closed, but they pointed me to a different kid of flight historic/museum place. Daniel was a trooper as I kept having to say, well this isn't it and we have to go somewhere else. He loves air planes and was super excited!! He loved to see all the different planes and how big they were.

The next day however was not as fun. Daniel woke up from his nap with the stomach flu. It was pretty rough on him and he couldn't keep anything down for about 12 hours. After that he started to get better, but it has taken a long time to get his tummy feeling completely better. Amelia too came down with the stomach flu the next week. It was a little less rough on her, but no fun none the less. I am glad that is over and that Michael and I didn't' come down with it as well.  I am glad I had watched the reality TV show about the Duggers when they and their 5-6 little kids got sick. They put a paper towel into a paper cup and have that handy for when the little ones get sick. It worked so good for Daniel, and you just throw it away! Super easy clean up!

 Daniel ate a lot of jello and crackers for a few days and his energy slowly came. We are glad most of the flu season is behind us!!

Little baby bump

 Here we are at 18 weeks already, that is almost 5 months!! (In a few weeks... ) It has gone by fast. We had an ultrasound at 18 weeks and they said it all looked good. It always makes it more real to me after seeing that tiny little body moving all around. We found out we are having a little girl!! Amelia is so excited to have a sister and has talked about how she will be able to paint nails with us when she is born. We are excited and so glad things are going well. I have just started to feel some movement... I always seem to pick that up a little on the later side of things. But it is fun to know what that little girl is doing. Here are some cute pictures for your enjoyment :) A profile pic and a pic of one foot. Sorry I don't know how to rotate the pictures... I tried..

Halloween Costumes

So I realized I didn't have any pictures from Halloween. That is typical of me, I never take pictures when I am busy with the kids... like Halloween. But I borrowed these from a Peter, who was at our church Halloween party.  Thanks for taking the pictures! Daniel was an airplane, or in his words a hairplane. Amelia was a princess on a white unicorn. I was a jelly fish, and Michael was a lego man. The kids LOVED their costumes and played with them all month before halloween.

up-date

 Here is a quick fall update.... 

Early in the fall I tried pruning our pear tree again. Last year I pruned is severely and it didn't produce fruit, but we are hoping for some next year. I was a little more kind to the tree this time. :) Amelia had a bast helping by getting all the fallen branches that were stuck up in the tree.

For the first time ever, with the help of Jeanne, we hosted a book club. I choose the book "Swimming to Antarctica."  I loved the book and thought it was very inspiring. It is about an open water simmer who ultimately swam to antarctic. I really enjoyed how she described her experiences and how she kept herself on track when things were difficult. I recommend it, however I am not sure it was a favorite of the group, so read at your own risk :)

 Jeanne and I had fun decorating and doing food for the night. Jeanne made a cool watermelon boat. The boats were critical to the swimmers success. I made some fishy cracker sea things.

 I am not sure when this picture was taken but it is cute.

 We are getting rid of these trees in our yard, they were a nice idea, but I don't like their location, and we don't have any other location. Do you want them? One pear and one plum.

Another cute pic :)

We joined my sister this year at an Apple Farm to pick out pumpkins  and to tour their apple orchard. They let you come in and see how they pack the apples, make cider, and apple pies. They have a brand new facility with a little cafe that we enjoyed very much as it sprinkled some of the time. They had a place where you could taste test some 10+ apples. One was pink in the middle and another they side had a lemon taste, and another that was pear like.

 Pumpkin carving! John joined us and we all had fun this year! But Daniel can't wait to use the cutters all by himself next year :)

This is Amelia's pumpkin. It is, in her words, a princess dog with a party hat. I love it! :)

An Announcement!

We are so happy to announce that we are expecting a new little one to join our family in late May 2013!

First Day of Preschool 2012

 Amelia had her first day at preschool today. She LOVED it and can't wait to go back! She talked about it for the next hour and half after she got home.

 I was a little sad to be letting my little girl go. But I know her teacher is great, and that Amelia would be in heaven to be at school with her friends. (She knew at lest 3 of the other kids in her class.)

Amelia picked out her new backpack, and if you can't tell it has a lot of pink and sparkles! Amelia's favorite! 

 After dropping off Amelia I brought Daniel back to the car. He just sat there and said "Daniel sad..." It was so sweet I had to take a pic. He asked if we were going to pick up Amelia yet about 5 times during the two and half hours she was gone.

Hope everyone had a great first day at school!