White House III

Link to the new blog!!!

2010-10-18T23:32:00.000-04:00

I completely forgot to link to my new blog from this one thinking most of my readers were also friends on Facebook! Sorry.

My new blog can be found here http://whitehouse3.com. Hope to see you over there! Let me know you found it.

Rain is so awesome

2010-09-27T22:17:00.000-04:00

Unless you have grown up in a desert you probably do not truly Love the rain in a "Can't wait for It to happen again" kind of way. Yesterday and today my inspiration was the rain. It started during the last hour of church as I was trying to re-acclimate poor Maddy to her nursery class. Starting three Sunday's ago she cried from just after she got there until I came in to take them potty. Then last Sunday she cried which turned into an unrecoverable cry we heard clearly through the partition in the primary room. Guy went in until he had to go teach the young men. She totally lost it so they brought her to my class. About one minute after she left Blake lost it so he came along too. My 5 year olds loved it. Since the primary kids were practicing for the primary program yesterday I took the opportunity to spend the time in the nursery with the kids. Madison cried even with me there for about 5 minutes. About 30 minutes into it she was acting normal. I left for ten minutes to use the bathroom and see how she did. She started crying again which got Blake going and when another mom brought her son back from the potty he was crying. Just walking back into the room she was fine again. I sure hope we can talk this week and convince her to love nursery again. She loved it from the first time she went a year ago until now. So weird.

Back to the rain. Madison noticed it was dark and raining outside as soon as we got into the foyer. I'm still not sure how she saw that trough the mass of people crowding the doors and open area. She was smiling from ear to ear as she told me. Blake wondered off down the hall towards a less crowded door then came back excitedly telling me about the dark heavy rain. Guy showed up a minute later and asked Blake if he wanted to run to the car with him. Blake started screaming in excitement they were going out in the rain!!!! Heads were whipping around to look at us with some excited and some showing concern maybe from the start of a headache from the deafening noise. That kid is loud, very loud. Maddy and I followed and she also expressed excitement with me about going out to the car. We put the loose papers in the zipper bag and I handed over the keys to Guy. They were off like lighting out the door on the way to the car. Since I love rain so much, I took the time to slip off my shoes and we calmly walked past the gaggle of people waiting out into the dark heavy warm rain. It was beautiful. Madison loved it too. At the end of the sidewalk she decided she also needed her shoes off to enjoy our walk to the car. I slipped them off for her and we continued to the Trooper. We were soaked in that short 40 foot walk to the car. Maddy's shirt came off so she didn't get a chill in the car. All of us sat there soaked and happy during the ride home.

Today, I was in the kitchen starting to do dishes when I see my son out the window in the driveway by the garage. He was yelling about it raining and playing in it. I guess he though he had permission after our conversation earlier. The rain had stopped for an hour or so when I was asking them to come in the house. Blake told me he wanted to stay outside and play in the rain. I told him he couldn't because it wasn't raining. He must have remembered that conversation and headed right out the front door, down the steps and into the rain. Kids are so smart. We delayed nap time to play in the rain for about 30 minutes today. They loved it. It was the fastest Madison has gone to sleep in a long time.

Here are a few images from our Saturday spent cleaning up the front garden area. It was so bad and it now looks so much better.

An extra hour and $28 later we were able to borrow our neighbors trailer to get some mulch.

We had so many colors to choose from!

We decided on this one.

Guy thought it would be fun to let the kids get out to watch him scoop it up to put in the trailer.

I may not be able to get my kids to look at me all the time, but they will almost always hug or hold hands when asked.

Maddy was being a little standofish.

Then I started to tease her.

He came over with the tractor only to have Maddy get scared. Didn't see that one coming {insert saurcasm}.

In went the lovely mulch and we headed back to home...

With a stop by some cool wildflowers for me to photograph.

Hope you have a great day!

Yeah, yeah, yeah... I'll explain

2010-09-24T15:32:00.002-04:00

I keep promising to blog more and failing fantastically. Well, I finally figured out why this last month has been a no go. It may take a while to get it all out as to why.

This may come as a complete shock to most people who haven't seen or talked to me in person lately, but it was a major adjustment to get used to and actually be happy we are going to have another baby. You see, when we did our last fertility treatment in January we really felt that was it. That it would be the last and final opportunity to become parents again by our own bodies. We got rid of pretty much everything related to babies except for the stroller and a few things to use as photo props. Whenever we talked about a third child we talked about going through foster care where we can get a child that is available for adoption the twins age.

When my normal signs of the start of a new menstrual cycle came and went with no start of a new cycle the weirdness began. Then the symptoms of pregnancy started. I couldn't believe it. It had to be a weird cycle and all in my head. Guy also was in total disbelief until Madison asked him to read the book titled I'm a Big Sister. I got a test I'd given away to a now pregnant friend to take. Sure enough both that test and the one two days later were positive. We ended up telling our parents the day of the first positive test. Guy made a Facebook announcement so I put something not so obvious on this blog. It was out. We got all these super positive and often teary responses from all.

But I wasn't happy. Not unhappy either. It was the start of a month long funk my brain needed to sort all of it out. My body was once again taken over by an alien affecting every detail of my life. Whenever Guy and I talked anything about the pregnancy/future baby it was negative. You know, stuff like having to wake up in the middle of the night, how to reconfigure our small house {that also houses a business!}, we can only use one of our SUV's, having to get baby stuff again, getting cloth diapers again and so on and so on. Guy never specifically told me he was happy or anything positive. Even though I KNEW he was happy I don't think I really felt it.

Finally, this last week I finally started to feel happy and excited about another baby. I'm definitely not one to bond or even feel like a baby is real in-utero. Even feeling movement and seeing features on an u/s don't make it real for me. The only real thing is seeing that baby covered in funk just after delivery. It's checking the baby out in the privacy of our own hospital room trying to decide which of the names we like fit. The bonding is done with the hours and days of service given to the helpless newborn then baby while getting to see the first glimpses of personality and preferences. The loves grows each and every month as the baby develops into a walker, toddler and beyond. With each shared experience from the quietest of moments to the loudest test of wills we gain those familial feelings that will last throughout this life and into the eternities.

This is my 7 week pregnant belly. Not much, but surprising to me since nothing at all showed with the twins until 9+ weeks. The joys of a second pregnancy since the uterus 'knows' what to do.

We went to Cody's birthday party last weekend. The kids practiced singing happy birthday for two weeks once they received their invitation. They would carry it around and sing every once in a while. Cody let me snap a few images of him.

Talking a taking a picture don't always mix in low light. Just after snapping this image Madison did a face plant re-injuring her knee.

I brought her into the kitchen giving her a good cuddle and wiped off the blood with a paper towel. Melissa, one of Maddy's favorite people, gave her the sympathy oooooo's Maddy loves and took her into the bathroom for some ointment and bandaids!

Since Cody is the main bandaid wearer in their house she got cool rough and tumble boy bandages.

Then she got some love and support from Blakie. Yes, this girl knows how to work a room for the maximum amount of cuddles and sympathy she can get. The funny thing is, she usually prefers me first who gives the least amount of sympathy since I am a 'tough it out' kind of person and mom.

You know, there is a reason this kid usually looks like he is talking in images. He usually is! He is a talk talk talker.

He has moments of reflection or really is just making facial contortions trying to make people laugh at him. Can someone be both the class valedictorian and the class clown?

This charming smile is for Melissa.

And then I got a charming smile!

We were talking about going to do something fun right here and both are obviously excited about it. They had a great time at the party. Surprisingly, Blake was scared of the fireworks preferring to go inside to watch cartoons while Madison loved them cheering Paul on to light more and clapping excitedly for her favorites.

Being the large child I can be I taught them how fun it is to pull down a balloon and hit it repeatedly. They had a blast.

"Get it, Blakie!!"

LOL

Cody with his cupcakes.

He got it all in one breath.

He got tons of things Lego. I'm pretty sure his lego collection hit at least 500K that night.

During the present opening the kids enjoyed the fruits of their not so good scramble for the pinata candy {Alyssa gave them all of hers}.

Melissa snapped a few shots of the kids & I.

It was a great night! Too bad the kids weren't old enough for the sleep over part. They did do a great job of lasting until almost 10 pm when we got home since they normally go to bed before 8 pm.

If you aren't a regular reader of my photography website you should definitely check out my newest post. It shows our gorgeous new images in our WALL GALLERY found in our dining area. http://lifelongimpressions.com/yay-new-wall-images/

In honor of my new found out-of-the-funk life I've decided to do a 365 project. A 365 project is when you take an image every day. The last time I started one it was winter time and about self portraits. Yeah, that didn't go to long. This time my images are going to be about whatever I'm thinking about that day and about finding more inspiration in life & photography.

Great husband, Great day, Great insurance relief

2010-09-01T22:06:00.000-04:00

I am so thankful for Guy! Not only is he a fabulous husband and dad, but he is also mechanically minded. He has a fabulous mind that can take a bit to look at something and figure it out. Tonight it was super hot in our kitchen. It's always hot in the afternoon in our kitchen with the sun shinning in the back window and door. It triggered something in Guy's mind though. He noticed that no air was coming out of the vent under the kitchen sink. Nada. Nothing. He went to investigate leaving us to huddle on the floor next to each other by the open vent. After a while we heard the rustling which got Blake super excited. He called out to 'Dad' who answered him back. It was definitely the highlight of his day. They also loved when Guy shined the flashlight up the vent as well as the old Cheerio and upside down dead bug.

Guy found trouble. The drip pan drip pan drain was plugged which caused that particular 27 foot long piece of ductwork to become flooded collapsing the inside in on itself. He poked a hole in it draining out about a gallon of water. The duct started working again pumping a real nice musty smell into the house which is just something a pregnant woman wants to hit her already hyper sensitive olfactory senses. Our awesome friend, Travis, lead Guy to check the drip pan & confirmed he could pick up replacement ductwork at Lowe's. Guy fixed the clogged drain, and we all headed to Lowe's. The parts cost $45 dollars, and we saved a ton with Guy doing the labor. The air now blows super cold and super strong in the kitchen. Better then it has since we moved in over two years ago. No wonder our electric bill was about $40 higher then normal for that month of the year.

Over the weekend we went to an Australian Rules Football game {otherwise known as Footy} with our local North Carolina Hawks against the Florida Saints. Our team didn't win mostly for not playing the ball as they were trying to play the man going for the ball instead. It's pretty hard to gain control of the ball if you don't go for the ball. We enjoyed ourselves so much. The kids Love to be out and about. Typically we don't have any meltdowns while out and about since they enjoy themselves so much. I love love this image of Blake reaching over to lay his hand on Guy's arm while he watched the game.

Blake wondering why I keep calling him to look at me. He started out with this really cool faux hawk, but the muggy heat made short work of any hairdo. Watch how Blake's hair goes from sort of dry here to super soaked as the images go on.

Madison is telling me about the ball as she watches the players handle it.

Our first spot wasn't the best with a couple sitting in front of us. We moved a little closer to the field and over to the side of them. Madison decided to help out by taking her chair over, and she actually took it all the way over to the new spot.

Before we left the house that day we told the kids where we were going. Blake immediately went over to the bucket of balls in their room to pull out a Footy to bring. Madison decided she wanted one too and grabbed the volleyball calling it a footy. lol Even after she was reminded it was a volleyball she wanted to bring it with us. They both carried their balls from the car to our spot on the sidelines, took care of them while there and carried them back to the car.

This face cracks me up. With the bright sun/bright clouds and ill fitted sunnies Blake was squinting badly.

During halftime Guy and Blake played with the footy. This shot makes Blake's hands look massive for a 2 year old. He loved playing ball with Guy.

He threw the ball strait up here and was so proudly watching his handiwork.

Madison threw her ball then threw a fit it was far from her. Blake ran to get it for her little hot diva self. She's lucky she has such a nice caring brother. Guy and I were telling her to go get it herself since she threw it over there.

Throw the ball up then jump in excitement as you watch it come back down!

Then get it back to throw it to daddy.

This picture may not be cute to anyone else, but I was there. She was so into watching the people walk by. As a person or group would pass her she would grab her dress and sway to whatever song was in her head as she watched them walk away.

Blake tagged along with Guy to go visit someone he knows who had a dog with them.

Madison could not miss out even though we all know she would freak out a bit over the dog. I love that even though she knew they would see a dog over there she decided to face her fear to be with her family and experience what Blake wanted to do. She ended up actually petting the dog which was a huge accomplishment for her.

The kids love to take pictures and love to take them of us most of all. I was trying to help Blake see through the viewfinder until he saw me and push the button. He wasn't getting it that day making me laugh. The reflection is pretty cool though.

The kids spent the last few minutes of half time running around like mad.

Blake often has his hand up to his face when he is giggling. I was playing with him like he would get tickled for the next few shots.

Notice the super soaked hair.

My cute family with our chairs crammed under the shade of the one umbrella!

I took five shots and got one person looking at the camera smiling in each one of them. lol They definitely didn't have their timing right.

Then I realized that I hadn't taken any images of the game! Oooops. Footy is a game that is played on an oval field the size of a polo field. It's huge. Since my portrait business doesn't need a telephoto lens we don't have one. Luckly there was some action close the sideline we sat by. Even though you can see the players waiting on the sideline hopefully you can see where the action is.

I love to see plays where the players are getting major air.

The last shot of my super sweaty boy. Guess what? The kids didn't have to go to the bathroom once while out there. lol Who did? I'm pretty sure that port a potty didn't see any action with as much sweating as everyone there did.

My friend and I started a weekly playgroup. Today was the second week. It has already been a ton of fun. The kids were so excited when Emily and her twins walked up to the door. Madison ran through the living room into the kitchen shouting at the top of her lungs, "Who's here. Who's here! Who's here to see us!!" It was so cute. The kids all did great playing with each other! We only had a couple issues to break up, and a snack time to get to quickly for the low blood sugar toddlers. lol Food is always a good fix.

Still can't believe we are going to have a baby! Oh, my. It definitely doesn't feel real despite the nausea and other symptoms. Since Guy is covered under a group plan we can cancel my individual non maternity policy and add me to his. So as of October 1st I will have maternity coverage!!!! YAY!! Huge financial concern is now resolved. This has definitely helped us get more excited for our super surprise miracle baby. *Local ladies... I'm looking for an OB who supports VBAC's {vaginal birth after cesarean} and delivers at a somewhat close hospital. My labor with the twins, Blake, was so fast I don't want a 40 minute drive to Rex again in case this one comes faster.

Weird Guy

2010-08-24T13:11:00.000-04:00

Since my lovely husband made a Facebook announcement I thought I'd post something on the blog which feeds to Facebook. Oddly enough our 3% chance one cycle a month actually happened. What happened, you say? Oh, pregnancy! Really?!?! We had counted out that measly 3% chance one cycle a year as not something that would ever happen to us. We were totally fine with our two kiddos. Now we get a curveball.

It's still super early so a m/c can happen which is why we are not exactly jumping for joy like last time. That and both of us turned into immediate stress balls about money. Since my chance of getting pregnant was so low we cancelled the $350 a month maternity rider on my insurance policy as we were really stressed out trying to pay $600 a month just for my insurance. The joke is on us though as it will cost way more then the $4000 those extra premiums would have cost to have a baby paying the doctor & hospital.

Off the negative stuff! Madison has been obsessed with the book "I'm a big Sister now" for the last month. Anytime I ask them to choose a book it is the one she brings me. She took the book to Guy last night before bed. He refused to read it to her knowing I'd be taking a pregnancy test in the morning. :-) He knew then it was inevitable we would having another child next year. The second set of multiples jokes have already begun too. Statistically it is more common for a woman over 35 {me 37} to have twins as the ovaries tend to have last hurrahs in the declining years. One would be just fine of either sex and hopefully super healthy.

We'll be able to take more funny images like this one when visiting with friends! Love it!

Curiosity

2010-08-23T21:29:00.000-04:00

Curiosity is a great and terrible thing. This statement is true for everything. For me in the photography business, it means more work trying to accomplish learning or doing whatever I'm curious about. This is great in the newfound knowledge, skills and offerings, but not so great for the amount of work I need/want to accomplish on a given day. For the kids I think we all know what curiosity brings both great and terrible.

Blake is looking pretty pleased here. For a little background, I have a desk with my computer set up in the living room. It makes it so I can 'hop to' throughout the day constantly switching gears from work stuff to mommy stuff. In the mornings I work while they are eating their cereal then often a little longer while they color. Sometimes they play on the front porch that wraps around the front and side of our living room with big windows and a glass door I can keep an eye on them. Last week they were done coloring and headed out to the porch. I heard them and looked up to make sure their little heads went to the windows. After about 10 minutes of them not coming back in at all, but staying in site, I happened to glance over at the table. NO crayons.... Uh OH. In the image here Maddie is holding a scrub brush.

Here she is scrubbing away at the porch rail {in vein} to get the crayon marking off.

Blake doing his best {also in vein} to get the crayon off. Luckily we had three scrub brushes so I had the main muscles needed to get that stuff off. Unfortunately my muscles weren't enough...

Here's a close up of the damage. They got every single post facing inward to some degree with crayon along with some of the floor planks and the glass table tops.

The white is chalk which just washed off.

I finally thought of my old friend, Comet, who helped me get the boost needed to get the crayon off. The kids actually did a fabulous job of scrubbing the entire time I was cleaning off the posts to help me. They pretty much refuse to clean anything by themselves and demand that Guy or I help them with whatever the clean up project is. Hopefully, they stay willing to clean for a long long time!

Yesterday in the late afternoon Guy says to me that Madison is way to quiet. We called for her to come in the living room. After a minute she came out with a big smile on her face. I asked her what she was doing and she lifted her dress to happily show me her artwork. Wondering where she could have possibly gotten a marker to make these kind of marks I headed to her room. There was my black eye liner with its cap replaced lying next to the make up bag. Guy suggested I take some pictures so we headed to the back porch to catch the last 5 minutes of daylight.

Blake was busy telling his Maddy that what she did was bad and then he turns to me flashing this silly grin. The kid has so much personality.

Madison thought she was doing well flashing me all kinds of smiles since I was taking pictures of her artwork {hence why I don't do it most of the time}. We had to have a serious discussion about why she cannot draw on anything but paper and only with her crayons. Such a sweet remorseful face with the black eye liner mark by her mouth.

She's starting to think it's funny again here transitioning from serious to smiley.

Back to the grumpy face thinking of how she did a bad thing.

The designs were rather interesting. She's starting to use a teeny tiny bit of control when coloring.

Then they were off to play on the slide.

Happy as can be

Until she remembered to check out her artwork. She really wanted to take a bath to clean up though not enough to cry about it. I made her wait until normally scheduled bath time.

Love this shot through the tent at the setting sun.

Since I was laying down taking that shot it made it easy to take a picture of me too.

And another. Not that you can tell in this image, but I got about 4 inches cut off my hair. It's awesome. The cut works absolutely perfectly with the perm remnants for a nice wavy body. It dries nice with very little product needed {only a bit of leave in conditioner to keep the frizz away}.

Blake and Madison wanted to get in on the action taking pictures with mommy. It was a bit harder to get a focus and two of in the frame holding the heavy camera at arms length with a 50mm lens on it. A 50 mm isn't very wide so it takes only a small view from arms length away. This shot is another example of not good focus, but an image I love. He was so serious about getting in an image with me smooshing his sweaty head against mine. He didn't get the whole lay down next to me part.

His happy look as he looked back at me before going into the house.

I have not idea what he was saying. This kid constantly talks. OK, maybe he only talks about half they day, but it feels like a lot. Sometimes he has so much to say he starts stuttering trying to get it all out at once.

I'm pretty curious to see what is going to happen next in our life. Hope it's a lot of great things! One great thing that has happened the last couple weeks is the loss of 2 more pounds. I'm officially only 1 pound away from the weight we got married at {and spent my high school years weighing}. Though my muscle mass is no where near as impressive so about 5 more pounds can come off to be the most comfortable skinny weight with no funny lumps anywhere. Happy to stay here and happy to lose a few more to see what it feels like.

Buh Bye!!

The new website & blog are here!!!

2010-08-20T21:53:00.000-04:00

My new site is up! It is the same old website address, but it is now the website and blog for Lifelong Impressions. I have a ton of new information on there including some lower sitting fees, new charitable giving in honor of Ella's Touch, photography classes and much more. There is also a newsletter sign up {big hint... Friends who get their images by me really NEED to sign up for a newsletter}. I'm also working on some cool new stuff like an upcoming special mini session event with only a $10 session fee! This will be announced in the newsletter first.

If you follow the Lifelong Impressions blog make sure to follow the new web address as the old blog will no longer be used. http://lifelongimpressions.com All the links in this email are to the new blog address. It does have a feed that has been showing up wonderfully in my Google Reader application. Love Google Reader!

I'm pretty sure I'll be switching this blog over to a Wordpress blog in the next few months as well. I LOVE Wordpress and all it offers in terms of flexibility and information. Paired with Bluehost.com it is a wonderful option. My Lifelong Impressions images are now loaded directly into the page with no link to Flikr, they are right click disabled, I was able to integrate forms directly into the site & the platform was really easy to learn.

No images tonight, but I have a few from this week I can't wait to share. Now that the website is done, it is back to a regularly scheduled life. Guy will be sooooo happy.

For all the local friends... My friend, Kim, and I are committing to a play date every Wednesday morning at 9:30 or 10:00 am. The place will change each week, but we'll let you know where it will be. This first one is at my house on Wednesday morning starting at 9:30 am. Please call {919-585-6433} or email {shannon@lifelongimpressions} to let me know you are coming, but even if you decide to come at the last minute, just show up. Looking forward to many mornings of fun for us and the kids.

Now, go check out the new website & sign up for the newsletter!

More Miami plans!

2010-08-16T09:04:00.000-04:00

The greater then average number of comments on my last post tells me you guys really do read my personal blog. I'm sorry for neglecting it the last six months. And for all those who loved the images I must confess we moved the bed in our bedroom so the light would be more favorable for any future picture ops. I like it much better with the new arrangement.

Saturday I stepped in an ant pile during the last part of my photo shoot. I have never done that before! Luckily the pain of the first few bites alerted me to an issue. Somehow with hundreds of ants I only got 4-5 bites. Yeah, amazing!!! They are also the kind of ants that only leave a minor bite & not those huge swollen bites.

We have made plans to spend the week of Thanksgiving in Miami! All of us are super excited to go again. Our wonderful client, Therese, has offered up her condo to us again. Since I haven't ever shared images from our last trip you get to see a few today.

This is the view from the condo overlooking the Port of Miami and South Beach. We took our bikes down with the kids seats on the back. We went on 4 nice long bike rides exploring everything from South Beach to the downtown area along the waterfront to the South. We all loved the experience getting to know the area by bike. The Port of Miami is also where our cruise left out of back in March. Two of the cruise ships are leaving in this image.

Blake thought he'd try out the binoculars our first morning. This trip was the first time the kids slept in big beds by themselves. They only fell off a couple times... It's a good thing we thought ahead to put some pillows along the sides. Since then they learned their boundaries and haven't fallen off any big beds they have slept on since.

The tram system was great to get around in. This station was right behind the condo building.

We decided to take the tram & a couple grocery bags to the Publix store. It was not one of our more brilliant ideas. We got enough to feed us most meals for the week. That is a lot of food for four people to carry back to the tram, keep track of two 2 year olds and carry from the tram up to the condo. DUH. It would have worked out just fine if we had brought a cart of some kind or even a suitcase.

Blake wanted to help carry some of the groceries.

He did pretty well.

Then Madison wanted to help him.

But... She decided it wasn't her thing and walked on. I love the unconcerned look for leaving our groceries behind.

You know, I never realized how badly escalators are designed when it comes to kids until right when I took this image. In order to get the angle right I had to squat down. When I tried to get up with balancing the camera, groceries and camera bag I put my hand on the side wall. Big mistake. It is stationary! So it pulled me backwards. Thankfully, I managed to let go quickly and gain my own balance. Since kids cannot reach the hand rail at the top there is nothing for them to grab onto except the side wall for balance.

Us in the tram. The kids were a bit worn out from their walk since we couldn't pick them up with all the groceries.

They perked back up soon enough.

Well, maybe just Madison perked up.

She had to mess him.

Here is another view of South Beach from the condo.

My friend Mary came over with three of her kids since the others weren't feeling well. We all went swimming at one of the 14th story pools. They are designed so one gets the sun during the morning and the other at night. If it is windy it is likely that one of the pools will not feel the effects too. They had a BBQ area, sand volleyball court, pool table, lounge and putting green out there too.

Guy was trying to get Madison to 'swim' to him. She has just started trying to swim when we went swimming last week. It is so funny to watch. She'll pull the water towards her with her hands and does an upright running man to go forward. Next year we'll definitely do swim lessons.

Mary's identical twin girls, Jessica & Nicole, along with their big sister Gabi. Check out the goofy faces the girls were making making Gabi and all of us laugh. The super full diapers also cracked me up.

Guy was giving Blake a head start push towards the side. The push is Blake's favorite part.

He definitely wasn't swimming strait, but he started getting it very quickly.

Here is Mary. She had both girls in her arms most of the time. Us twin moms develop serious guns with all the double holding we do. With two kids in your arms there is no way to use your hip to hold them and the other arm can't come over to support the main hold arm as it is the main hold arm for the other kid. Moms with kids super close together have the same thing. Though they can use the hip to the side of the heavier child and 'arm' hold the lighter one.

A view up the condo building from the pool. We had a great puffy clouds that would come and go while we were at the pool giving the perfect shade and sun combo.

Another shot of the girls showing off a loaded diaper.

Gabi chillin.

The girls all did their towels like capes which Madison and Blake had to do too. They loved it. Madison paused for one of her princess poses.

Guy held the gate opened for everyone including his straggler picture taking wife.

Guy started his new position as a Garner High School resource officer this morning. School doesn't start for a week, but he has some things to get together including meeting the staff.

Don't make the elliptical machine mad!

2010-08-14T23:16:00.000-04:00

My cutie patootie Blake. You know, I don't think there is a day that goes by that one or both kids doesn't get injured in some way. Most of the time it is them not paying attention. Sometimes it is them fighting.

This adorable melancholy look is because Blake did a pretty good injury to his finger.

Before we get to the injury I just have to say how much I love this girls smile. It lights up everyone around her when she gives it. At the grocery store today she was lagging behind on the way out. The lagging was due to her choice of shoes. Yes, hers! Apparently she feels fashion is much more important then function or comfort. We have some flip flops with pink ribbon wrapped around the strap with big bows. The cannot figure out how to keep her feet in them, and the extra fabric around the toe part rubbers her toes and top of her foot raw. She HAD to wear them and fought with them the whole time. Back to the smile. A clerk behind the customer service counter looked at her. She smiled & waved at him. Next thing we know about 3-4 workers are enthralled with her. They probably all spent the next half our smiling uncontrollably.

Back to the injury. I'm a little scattered at the moment!

Blake put his hands in the plastic bit that surround the gear between the handle and foot parts. He must have pulled it apart a bit. It snapped shut on him and he ripped his hand out. It gave him two long jagged cuts down the pad of his finger and a pocket like cut out along the side of his skin. Luckily, they were pretty shallow so no need for stitches. However, he was moaning on for a bit about the pain.

All of a sudden Guy notices his finger is crooked! He asks me if I think it might be broken. My heart stops as I look at it.

But then I remembered. I pulled up my own hand to check out my fingers and the middle finger is definitely crooked in just the same way. LOL Way to give us a fright. Guy looks at my hand, then looks at Blake's, and then back at me to say, "That is a deal breaker."

I had to laugh. It's a bit to late to just now be noticing my crooked finger to call it a deal breaker. We're coming up on 8 years of marriage.

I love the next two shots of Blake and Maddie checking out Blake's hurt finger.

He has been obsessed by band aids, while I've been equally obsessed with giving his cuts some air time to heal. Band aids always make the skin so puckery and water logged looking. Since Blake sweats a lot he definitely needs some air time too. He's starting to give in to my side, but goes to Guy anytime I'm not looking to demand some more creme and band aid. As long as he gets in a few air hours a day it's all good to me.

Just after it happened, while I was still holding the paper towel on it until the bleeding stops, he had a few requests. The first request was to cuddle. The second request was to watch Harry Potter {which he pronounces ava cado}. The third request was for a popsicle.

My mom happened to call just after he hurt himself and was still crying almost hysterically. Not much control over his emotions, this kid. When we called her back she said he sure knew how to milk it after laughing over his requests.

Madison was kissing Blake's owie with super chicken pecking speed which didn't let me get a focus. This is so cute though!! There is no way it was going to the trash over something so minor. All the emotion is still captured.

A quiet moment.

So my little stinker has been a little mopey since it happened. He holds it nice and stiff most of the time flipping people off. So if he does it to you, now you know we aren't teaching him bad things.

Have an awesome Sunday!

Drama was on today's agenda

2010-07-21T21:56:00.001-04:00

Maddy sticking her belly through the water.

Blake trying to convince himself to jump or step over.

Today was about drama. My levels were super mild yet dangerous drama. Hmmmm, not sure if that comment made sense. Each time the drama happened I was strangely calm about it. There was no elevated heart rate or panic.

Well, I did move fast through the water to get to Blake who had snuck past me to try and drown himself. We put his floaties on Manon to see how she would do, and as I was helping get them on her he walked out to the deeper part to get to the older boys. He really wants to be with the older boys any time there are any around. He's going to be our kid in a hurry to grow up. Thankfully, Kim happened to look over to where Blake was to alert me to him going under. He did a fantastic job of kicking to the surface and holding his breath. We definitely did a bit of cuddling in the pool then again when we got home.

The second bout of drama happened when the kids got into the laundry room to play with the brooms & sweepers. Somehow they managed to knock the Windex off the washer. Madison loves to drink anything from any spray bottle. It doesn't matter what it is. It can be soap, perfume, make-up, water or anything else. It's always an adventure keeping up with her. This time it wasn't Madison, but somehow they shot Blake in the eye with Windex. It was a little red, and I used some eye drops on it a few times.

Later we were talking to my dad when I mentioned Blake got some Windex in his eye. He thought he remembered from his shop days that Windex gets worse over time. Sure enough, he looked it up and let me know it needs a full 30 minute flush. I was soooo not happy to hear that.

First we tried the sink. After some serious full body freak out from Blake getting us both pretty wet I decided to move us to the shower. We stripped down, got in and started the wild thrashing coupled with blood curdling screams. I'm pretty sure he was reliving his early episode almost drowning the entire time! It was so sad and 30 minutes goes by super duper slow when your child is having so much drama.

Other then those bits of time we have really had a great day. I'm realizing more and more how not so clear my kids talk since no one but me seems to understand what they say. I feel a bit like a parrot telling everyone what they are saying all the time. They seem so clear to me. Darn those mommy goggles! I mean hearing aids!

All the images on here are from the other day out front. I pulled out the camera to take a couple shots and ended up taking 90. Maybe that really qualifies as a few for me. Guy doesn't like the no shirts {especially for Madison}, but I was being lazy not wanting to put their bathing suits on.

a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/lifelongimpressions/4800258091/" title="LI Blog Jul1610-1108 by Lifelong Impressions {was Pics1vball}, on Flickr">

Blake is smelling Madison's knee to see if it is stinky.

Not stinky, but it sure was funny. Hope you have a great drama free day!

:-)

2010-07-16T22:48:00.000-04:00

Are you callin my mom a bad blogger?

Funny kiddo stuff & a Question

2010-07-03T13:59:00.001-04:00

I skipped a couple days in my quest to write in the blog every day. The big issue came when I had to buy the new Lightroom since the beta version expires today. It took a couple days to update the new catalogue and do some much needed image back up for both personal and business images.

{I think Madison looks like Kim Catrell here}

We went shopping days ago for groceries. I grabbed a frozen pizza for the kids & I. When Guy came back from grabbing a missed item we started discussing how much he was not a fan of frozen pizza {who is?}. I ended up putting the pizza back after deciding he would pick up a pizza on his way home from work sometime this week. We never discussed it again. Yesterday the kids ran out to meet Guy when he drove into the driveway. Blake said hi and then started looking past Guy into the car. He holds his palms up and hands out saying, "Pizza?" What an amazing memory! Guy didn't disappoint him again by showing up tonight with a yummy pizza! They both ate a ton. He ate 2 1/2 pieces.

This morning I gave the kids a choice in what they would wear. After putting all of Madison's shorts out on the floor she immediately picked out a light pink plaid pair. As I was scooping them up to put them back in the drawer she changed her mind very insistently saying she wanted the purple pair. For Blake I pulled out two pairs. There was a cool pair of funky stone colored cargos and a plain camouflage pair. He definitely wanted to were the camo shorts. It's so funny and amazing to me watching their preferences develop.

{Doesn't she look so cute?}

All that above text was written Thursday for the second time. It all got lost when I moved my computer into the kitchen for a design consultation. Once again I got distracted overall by work and doing some revised editing on the kids two year shoot.

We've decided to replace the large image hanging in our living room taken on the Great Ocean Road in Australia with something bright & bold of the kids. My issue is if we should do a storyboard, only one kid or one shot with both kids. It's just that I'm not in Love Love Love with any shot of the two of them together, though I like plenty of them. I don't think it would really matter if only one kid was featured. Do you want to weigh in with any thoughts?

{Weird camera tilt, awesome eyes}

Tonight Guy mentioned it was about time for bed. Blake did his typical sentence structure reply, "No. Night night Blakie, No!" Sometimes he doesn't begin with a no which can get pretty confusing since we think he is making a positive statement until we hear the no at the end. Anyway, the next thing he says made us laugh. "I want to go to a hotel. No, night night Blakie, no." Does this mean we travel too much? :-)

Sandy brought her sweet newborn 4th child over for a newborn session. The kids were so excited to spend a few minutes with her after our session. She was so gracious to allow my two year olds to hold her especially on a porch floor, and she smartly kept a hand on her the entire time.

Maddie did a surprising job of holding her for a while. Blake is checking them out here.

She's so excited, and little Saleah slept through all the jostling.

Blake asked me to take his picture specifically. Love it! He doesn't ask me very often.

The light is so pretty on my screened porch between the house & garage.

A good example of why mom kept her hand on Saleah.

So sweet

Blake really wanted to hold her...

But was happily done two seconds later letting go right after this image snapped.

Last week I found a cool Fan page on Facebook called the Inner Hooker. She sells patterns for a lot of things us photographers like to use as props. She put a call out for testers and my fingers flew to type in a quick 'Pick Me.'

I think I made it a bit loose and I thought I had the right yarn on hand then didn't.

I must say it was the first pattern I've ever followed! Yeah, as much stuff as I make it is all just thrown together.

This color looks absolutely stunning with Madison's eye color!

Baby it's hot out there

2010-06-27T23:32:00.000-04:00

The temperature gauge on my car said it was 99 degrees on the way to church. With the humidity around here it means more like 110 in Phoenix speak. This minus the moisture sucking wave that hits you upon first exposure. Around here it is more like an immediate adding of moisture. This brings me back to softball yesterday. Have you ever noticed that shady sweat and sunny sweat smell completely different?... Yeah, I know that sounds weird. Think about it though. Most of the time when I sweat it isn't really stinky. However, on a hot sunny day when I'm actively working my body is completely offensive to me. :-) Maybe everyone else wasn't knocked out by me, but then my normal smeller is pretty sensitive like a pregnant woman's.

Today is day three of blogging every day. I'm realizing how much I missed blogging. There are so many things that haven't been recorded in the last few months due to my lack of blogging. Bummer. One thing I forgot to mention is their two year stats. They aren't the top of the charts like they used to be. Blakie is coming in at only the 70th percentile and Mads is at the 90th. They weigh about 33-35 pounds. He is 35.5 inches tall, and she is 36.5. The girl is still bigger then the boy. The other day someone thought she was whining when he was since he still sounds like a girl too. ha

Today we are in for a treat! Guy got out the camera all on his own. With his work schedule and the twins naps they stayed home from church. He got them to play in the wiggly water sprayer. They had a great time.

Blake is one of the most expressive people. He also forges ahead with whatever is on his agenda.

Guy tells me he knew I'd love this shot when he took it. I do. She is holding herself so tall, but the little girl details of the chubby belly and around the knees. And what is that expression?! I'd love to know what she was plotting.

Maybe it was this run through the water.

Auntie Corri will be happy to see the awesome shades she helped Madison pick out. Anytime she wears these shades people stop us to comment on how adorable she is. When our niece, Karissa, was visiting last week we went into a Claire's {or something like it} for the first time in her life. Maddie was in super heaven! She went from rack to rack trying on glasses, little purses, hats & anything else she could swipe off the shelf. Karissa bought her some adorable butterfly earrings she has been proudly wearing ever since. I think I'm going to be in trouble on the accessory front once she gets a little older.

There is nothing cuter then seeing these guys hold hands and make sure the other is doing well on their journey through life. Just tonight Blake sat with Madison in her little chair made for one. Each of the had a cheek hanging off one side of the chair, and he had his arm around her shoulder as they sat there. They never let me get a picture of them being so sweet to each other.

So cute.

The end of a season.

2010-06-26T23:47:00.000-04:00

I have loved softball since I was a little girl. Fortunately last year my old neighbor invited me out to play on a church league with her. Oh YEAH! Sadly our season came to an end tonight. Happily we are the champs! Everyone has gelled together so well with good natured ribbing & some great playing.

So many people have helped out with the kids on the many evenings Guy has had to work during my games. There were other kids of players, parents of players, spectators from the church & a few helpers I brought along. On each occasion I tried to thank them up to the point of groveling {kidding}, but seriously there is a special place in my heart for each of my amazing helpers. It has been great to get out there and play. Playing sports is kinda my thing after photography. I wish I could be doing some kind of organized sport at least once a week. The kids have also certainly enjoyed their time with all the 'nanny's' and 'poppy's' {as they call anyone with grey hair} along with their love of just being out.

A camera is not really something I want to worry about while playing and keeping an eye out for where the kids are. This was the first time I was able to bring it to a game. The moments before the championship match on tournament day is a pretty good place to have one. It's too bad we lost the match and had to play just one more to win the championship. I think it was the first game we lost in weeks.

Thanks for the great times ladies and coaches!!!

Love of children

2010-06-25T22:49:00.000-04:00

It's absolutely amazing to me how much I love my children. I thought I'd love them, but the actuality is really cool. There are no words to really express what it is or how it feels.

Back when I was pregnant the babies didn't feel like real people no matter how many times I felt them move or saw them on ultrasound. Being a high risk pregnancy we had a Lot of ultrasounds. Whenever we discussed names I refused to call them a name before they were born. It was a good thing to since they both got their number 2 choice names and not the number 1 choices we thought they would fit.

When Blake was born they laid him on my still enormous belly. My first thought was, "Yep, that's a baby boy covered in goo, let them go get him cleaned up and get the other one out." So romantic & loving, right? We did have a stubborn girl in my belly who we were trying to see if she went down head first after he came out or not. She didn't so was tried to force to move. Nope, she came out the wrong way {c-section}.

After being put back together, recovery and clean up we finally got a chance to properly meet our babies in our room. They were nice to hold & I started to get a feeling about their personalities. The first few months were spent getting to know who they are. The super love I feel for them now started out as a joy in being a parent finally while settling into my parenting style. It comes about so naturally with all the little interactions throughout each day.

I've started a new thing the last few weeks when the kids wake up from their naps. I greet them like we've been apart for weeks and ask if they had a great nap. Blake especially seems to swell in happiness before my eyes after the ecstatic greeting. These choices we make that seem so little at the time can sometimes become the stuff of our greatest memories later on.

Not sure what made me wax on so this evening. Maybe it's the photo above. I love it.

We got Guy

2010-05-30T23:27:00.000-04:00

This morning I worked with the kids a little before we called Daddy at work. When Guy answered the phone Blake loudly proclaimed, "Happy Birthday!" Then I put the phone over by Madison who also proclaimed, "Happy Birthday!" Guy loved it. I think it made his day to have his two sweet two year olds so excitedly wish him a happy birthday. Unfortunately, Guy, has food poisoning or a stomach bug. Hopefully, he feels better by tomorrow.

Today I had my third close call while driving this week. The first two were pretty spiritual experiences for me. Yes, weird, but true.

#1 On my way home from softball game Tuesday I found myself driving slow. When I thought about it I felt it was a good thing {normally a very lead foot}. I turned onto Cornwallis & saw three deer running through an old trailer park to towards the curve in the road. I got them to slow down & stop by driving a bit at them. After rounding the curve I saw a car coming really fast which I flashed my lights at a few times to get them to slow down along with the car a bit behind them. My feelings are that my slowing them down made it so someone coming around that corner didn't hit one of them.

#2 I dropped off my friend, Kim, at home after returning from the beach sessions in Atlantic Beach. Normally I drive pretty fast out of her neighborhood and once again found myself going a little slower then normal. Again I felt I should go slow and now speed up like normal. About 5 seconds later I came up to a curve where a school bus was coming around it fast right in the center of the road. It would have hit me head on being so much in my lane had I been going even a couple MPH more.

#3 We were on the way home from church today. The kids often talk about what is passing in their view as we drive. There was a large boat being pulled by a big pick up truck to our left. They were getting excited & I looked in the rear view mirror talking to them about the boat. When I brought my eye back to the front the trucks front end was coming into my lane. I had to make a decision on if he was just drifting a little or coming into my lane. I determined he sure was coming into my lane. Slamming on the brake or gassing it wouldn't have worked since their was a lot of length with the truck and boat. I looked ahead to check out the shoulder. Luckily we were in an area with a pretty flat shoulder that looked pretty solid and grassy. I let off the gas and moved to the shoulder at the same pace he was coming into my lane. By the time I fully was on the shoulder we had slowed enough to be behind him and able to get back into the lane. When I got into the left lane & passed him he looked like he wasn't even aware he ran us off the road!

For me #3 was a moment of celebration. There was no panic, just quick analytical decision making with no hesitation or over reaction. Many people would have jerked over to the shoulder or slammed on the brake in a knee jerk reaction which is more likely to become an accident. I really think it has something to do with being a what if person. I often think of what if situations. What if this happened? What should I do? By doing this I've actually been pretty prepared in many situations with quick reactions to situations. Of course, being in a ton of car accidents in my life has also probably made me hyper aware of how these huge chunks of metal & other crap can become a deadly weapon in the hands of distracted, complacent and aggressive drivers {more the first two!}.

Here are more images from the kids two year shoot. If you are seeing this on Facebook they are all different images & all ones I like better then the ones on Facebook!

My sweet baby girl! Guy said recently that Blake brings the excitement and Madison brings the love. He couldn't have put it more perfectly.

These particular pants do not stay snapped. I never can remember which ones they are until Blake has been wearing them for a while. We are so happy I didn't know those where the ones I grabbed for this photo shoot. Really, this whole shot wouldn't be nearly as cute with perfect pants.

Here we are singing their favorite wiggles song. The one about putting the bear to sleep. "Everybody clap."

"Turn around. Yeeee Heeee."

Here we got to the line repeated two or three times depending on if it is the first or second time the song is sung. "Bear's asleep. Shhhh shhhh shhhh." We love this picture so much for every little detail in it. Maddy doing the sleep and Blake the shhhh, Blake's pants again, Maddy's leg bruises & scrapped nose, how they are kind of looking down & just everything. I'm getting a hard case cover for my phone with this image on it!

Kim's son came up to his mom in church today to let her know Madison has a lisp. The leaders were blowing bubbles for the kids while waiting for the parents to come pick them up. She ran up to me to say, "Bubbleth!" I hadn't even noticed. Guy says he used to talk that way as a kid. Kim mentioned how she used to do that and her family made her place her tongue behind her teeth instead of between them. Sure enough, I had Maddy say bubbles for Guy and her tongue was between her teeth instead of behind them. Hmmmm. I love smart people who figure this stuff out. Who knew the tongue was so important?

We are trying to teach them how to catch. Not working so far. :-)

Happiness from head to toe!

Lovin on the bear.

Double cuddles... I know what double cuddles feels like.

Was I boring him?

Such a boy.

He's checking out daddy's badge. The hat is from his uncle Jareth. The badge on the hat is from his great poppy. The bear is from his great nanny & poppy. The handcuffs were just hanging out in the car so I grabbed them.

My awesome friend, Tammy, got a new studio set up. She let me come over And she helped with the crazy little people I call my kids! Here she is showing Blake how it's done. Love it!!!

He got it!

Maddy got in on the action. This is one of my top three favorites of her.

There she goes again.

He finally looked at me while jumping. He looks so little here.

The joy of playing with cool stuff.

Love this quiet moment!

And this funny look while fixing her hair.

Typical look and smile.

Another of my favorites. I was trying to get them to do something here, but she obviously wasn't wanting to.

He set up the stool and chairs for this.

Cuties.

Then it was tickle time.

More tickles.

LOVE IT!

Our trip was great! - Some two year images

2010-05-23T23:42:00.000-04:00

My friend just got a studio set up, and she was gracious enough to let me come take the kids two year images there! I acted just like so many other parents and got all huffy about the kids misbehavior. Well, they gave me awesome shots with all their antics & lasted a full two hours with no real snacks right before bedtime. They really are good kids.

Here are a couple tonight. This series is the first set of shots we took. Blake decided to be a little stinker and Madison was trying to be helpful. I LOVE the result even though I thought we were doomed to a terrible session when they were doing it. Blake is wearing an Australian Rules Football jumper & scarf from Guy's favorite team. Madison has on a new petit skirt & a funny shirt. I wanted them to look like they do all the time & not all perfectly put together.
{I'm not super thrilled with my edits as I think the background should be whiter, but I really don't feel like redoing it right now}

Life is back to normal!!!

2010-04-28T00:55:00.000-04:00

Can I say how excited I am to finally have gotten rid of the backlog!!! I now have a normal workload scheduled for the foreseeable future. Lovely.

We only have just over a week before we head to Atlanta, Tampa and then the fabulous Miami. We are starting to get all excited for our trip.

On Sunday I edited all of our personal images from February. I'll share a few {hundred... lol} with some comments about our month.

We spent a LOT of time in the bathroom with potty training. We do find it somewhat annoying to have to drop everything to take one {usually both} to the bathroom. But I wouldn't want them back in diapers again either!

She may have been tired of me taking her picture here. Or she was just playing at making faces. This forgetfulness is why I should process and blog our images much faster!

There were so many images that jumped out at me as my favorites. This is one of them.

She looks happy. And talkative.

I love to capture all the daily moments. Someday we won't have brightly colored dishes just for them. The sippy cups will be gone. Well, we already stopped using these, but Maddy {the milk LOVER} pointed at the cup in the image expressing her excitement and calling it milk.

Blake is Mr. Expressive. He has so many faces expressing every nuance of his thoughts and feelings. The saddest and sweetest look he gives is in the car. We are often out in the car right up to nap or bed time. He falls asleep easily. We ask him to stay awake. He does, but the look he gives us is so cute and sad. I need to capture it one of these days.

Waffles are yummy. My friend gave her kids waffles with peanut butter when I was over at her house. Genius! The kids love it. So the one shown has some butter and maybe syrup, but I wanted to share about the peanut butter.

Another favorite image.

I saw this frozen puddle while out at a photo shoot. No matter how I edit the image it doesn't even compare to the beauty of this puddle and the patterns in the ice in person. It was captivating. To me anyway.

This girl loves hats! Loves them.

Satisfaction.

My funny little man. We were playing tickles. Starting a couple weeks ago they started verbally asking me to tickle them. We usually have tickle time at least once a day.

I love this face. He always gets me. Oh, and he tries to get out of being in trouble with a cute smile.

But I usually stick to my guns with the discipline he needs to learn and grow.

One of his favorite things is throwing items. Pretty much anything. Tonight at my baseball game he clocked our friend's daughter in the face with a softball by accident.

I have no idea, but love it!

And both their faces here too. Oh, another new development, besides speaking in sentences!!, is to smile on command for pictures. Someone told one or both of them to smile recently and there it was. Not a funny weird picture smile either. Lucky!!

Blake spotted this image on Sunday and said, "Blake helping Daddy." It amazes me how much they remember and are reminded of when they see images. The cruise collage we have up definitely keeps their memory alive of our trip. They spot the pictures and start talking about the various things we did on the cruise.

Blake and Madison both love to help. Especially Blake. He loves to go and do and figure things out.

It is now Way past my bedtime so I'm off to bed.

We are

2010-04-16T23:21:00.000-04:00

We are so happy! Check out the photography blog and the Lifelong Impressions Facebook fan page to see some of the sweet images I've been able to be a part of recently. The great news is my backlog is finally gone! It is now onto a normal manageable work week for me. Love it! Here is a picture that just made me smile while editing a session. So cute!

We are enjoying the visit of Guy's parents. The kids get so excited every single time the see them after a nap or sleep. It's like they are completely surprised they are still here. The twins birthday is very close to their great grandmother's birthday. She passed away just before they were born. Today Guy's dad requested a picture of him, Guy and the twins. We made it into a card he sent to his sister. I love it!

We are headed to bed now.

More cruise pics & conversations

2010-04-05T09:48:00.000-04:00

Here are some of my favorite images from this next batch of cruise photos.

I hardly ever get them in the same photo together. Yes, for me this means maybe a couple times every other time we take pictures. It still feels like they are few and far between.

I love looking at the kids natural expressions of curiosity. It looks like Maddy got my big ears without the stick out part. This means they will not really be noticeable in most cases!

Blake has the most interesting and expressive eyes. He can communicate volumes with his eyes alone. They also photograph big with bright clear whites.

These two are so sweet and loving to each other most of the time. I love how they share and show affection. The other day Guy was having an ice cream pop dipped in chocolate. He was sharing with Blake when suddenly Blake ran out of the room. Guy hears Blake telling Madison there is ice cream and to come.

My conversation with Blake:

Me - Blake say 'My'

Blake - My

Me - Mommy

Blake - Mommy

Me - is

Blake - Awesome!!!

He said it with tons of excitement. That boy just melts me. That evening I excitedly tell Guy about what happened. Here's what happens next....

Guy - Blake say 'My'

Blake - My

Guy - Daddy

Blake - Daddy

Guy - is

Blake says nothing.

Guy says while gesturing to Blake to say something - is.....

Blake - Daddy

LOL. Now that is funny. Daddy is daddy and Mommy is AWESOME!

Here is the toddler pool slide Blake cracked his chin open on when the seas were so rough.

They loved going on it. Blake ran to get back on as fast as he could each time.

Madison loved it. She was also happy watching Blake's excitement as he ran & squealed.

Awesome splash

This photo is so cute. She is listening intently to Guy.

They had music playing over the loud speakers. Madison is showing us her moves here.

This face cracks me up with his anticipation of the super wet face. Check out his hand too.

He was so excited to go down he would fling himself down without sitting down. This is one of the few times he mostly sat down before letting go. The tongue out is so cute.

YEAH

The big pool with daddy.

I think only Guy is super dad enough to hold a kid while catching another jumping at him while not really touching the bottom. I was surprised at how deep it was. I could barely get a toe on the bottom in the shallow end! We were both surprised at how comfortable the kids were in the water. I think they definitely need to learn to swim since they have NO fear of the water.

Our little lumpa love.

Mr. Interesting

We were out on the dance floor learning to salsa dance, but we decided to hang out over in the lounge area after our potty time break.

The kids are starting to want to take lots of pictures themselves. This one is my nicely focused teeth. lol They haven't quite gotten the focus concept yet. They do know the buttons to take a picture, show pictures and navigate through the images.

Cool Maddy with Daddy's glasses on.

Blake is doing his thing. Maybe he was spotting a ship out the window or just loving the water.

Another kid shot. This time I'm nicely in focus & the composition isn't too bad.

He did NOT want to leave the lounge for lunch. They pretty much hated every meal we had on the ship. Other then meal time they did so well the entire cruise. But they didn't whine any more often then they whine at home so it was still awesome!

I love pretty much everything about this photo. The wind, soft light, her body movement, the profile, her dress, how all the colors work together. She loved how the wind came in from between the glass panels.

Love this one too.

And this.

This shot screams a warm summer afternoon of happy family time.

This was a test shot for the exposure that I love. Maddy and Blake are talking to each other. He loves to give her instruction on what he thinks she should be doing.

If Madison had her way we would have been out on the deck every waking moment. She would have come home way more tan then she already did. That girl got my tanning ability.

We took a shot similar to this {on a sunny day} on our first cruise printed as a 20x30 and is hanging in the guest bedroom. Now we plan on doing one as a family on any cruise we do in the future.

"The wheels on the bus go round and round" The song has been a favorite they ask for every night before bed for a long time.

TMI - Let's talk about poop

2010-03-24T15:50:00.000-04:00

{The first day of our cruise & the second morning pictures are shown.}

I don't know about you, but I'm not really an analytical person other then the quick day to day mind workings helping me make decisions. I don't get into learning the mysteries of the gospel as I'd rather master the basics first.

{There was music playing as we sailed out. Blake took turns dancing & watching everything go past.}

Every once in a while I get to thinking. Sometimes it's about silly things like why people drive the way they do. Guy & I had a conversation on the way to the airport about how you can tell what people are planning on doing by the way they drive. Just a little drift to the left will indicate someone is about to change lanes. Yep, there went the blinker and over they go.

{Madison had an accident just before getting on the ship. We only had new undies so she was pants-less for a few hours.}

This morning I had an in depth analysis {thinking not touching!} of my kids poop. They eat the same things at the same times. Blake eats a bit more then she does. They both have a glass of milk in the morning & around dinner time, and they both drink water during the day. Madison drinks a bit more water then Blake. What their individual bodies do with the same amount of food & water is WAY different. Blake pees less, poops softer & more often. Madison pees way more, and has super wide dry looking poop {less stinky too}. It makes me think the book I saw a long long time ago titles something like Eat Right for Your Body Type has some basis to it. My body works better when I eat red meat at least once a week & spicy foods. Anyway, I was thinking about poop today.

{They loved being in the airport. If we could still get to the gates like back in the old days, I would take them to the airport just for fun.}

{Maddy is waving to the plane.}

{And so is Blake.}

This weather has been fantastic! We had a good time getting out into the yard for some work & play. Besides my butchered job on one of the shrubs that is! We also stopped by Crabtree Lake park this morning to use the bathroom and play on the playground equipment. I definitely want to go back there for some trail walking/biking and rent some boats. I think the kids would like to get out on the water.

{It must be hard to see everything, dance & have to look at mom when she calls.}

{He is checking out the boat riding our waves.}

{The boat by the last bit of land we passed on our way out to sea.}

{There was a long line of boats coming in perfectly spaced.}

{I couldn't believe the color of the water. It is unlike any color I've seen in water before.}

{Madison & Guy}

{This is how much she loves Blake. They are always checking to see where the other one is.}

They loved how close the pilot boat was, even though by this time they were HUNGRY.}

{Bye Miami! Oh, I loved the moody sky.}

{I also love the pinky blue light first thing in the morning as the sun was coming up. They were loving looking out over the vast expanse of water.}

{It was exciting, amazing & thrilling for them.}

{Booger man was constantly scanning around us to see if he saw something new.}

{Madison was flirting with one of the many admirers she would find on the cruise.}

{I was surprised they were so comfortable on the open stairs with another level of stairs going down under that. We found they absolutely loved both the stairs & elevators on the cruise. They laughed hysterically every time we ran up or down the stairs. Maybe it was the running part... They also loved the mirrors, which Guy hated, in all elevators. We got into the habit of calling out what floor we wanted to get off on and what floor we were at to try and curtail the quick Blake from running off at every stop.}

{This one looks like an old ship to me with the funky B&W toning, light shapes, wires & smoke.}

(We went from the back to the front of the ship while waiting for the buffet to open. Yes, we were up That early. The first night and morning are definitely for trying to figure out where everything is.}

{We saw a lot of ships around us each day. Blake was a master at finding them.}

{Since Guy isn't a fan of pictures I have a lot of his backside. The bonus in this one is I'm actually in it. Well, my shadow anyway.}

What's worse then mice in your garage {or house}? Oh, I know...

2010-03-18T09:32:00.000-04:00

We have mice in the garage. Eawwww! We've known this for a while & have been a bit lax {ie super busy} on doing anything about it. Yesterday changed that. I'm still super grossed out. Really! Really grossed out.

Yesterday I had a senior photo session in the afternoon with Tayler Boldt {for those that know her}. Another clients sister is interested in learning photography wanted to tag along. Oh yeah, love having a free assistant! Cora met me at the house when we headed out to Tayler's house with the kids since her mom, Heidi, was going to watch them. At the house I had to remove a car seat. The easiest thing was to flip it upside down into the back of the Trooper. As I did there was some liquid that dripped out onto the seat. It was yellow. Yuk. I smelled it and it smelled like pee. Both kids were dry so it had to be from some other occasion we thought they peed after getting out of the car. So not fun. Then I noticed some little black things which at first I thought was food crumbs. Nope. It was mouse poop. Not only was it under the seat, it was in the seat!!!!! How in the world did a mouse or mice get into our vehicle?!?!?!?! I felt totally offended a mouse would get into my child's car seat. I scrubbed at it with a few wipes before putting it back in to come home. Today I need to get out there and clean the SUV out before we leave tonight for a BBQ at a friends house.

I was so upset I didn't think to take any pictures of it.

A sneak peak at our vacation

2010-03-14T23:49:00.001-04:00

Was I really thinking I'd finish all 682 photos from our vacation in a few hours today? Not really possible! I did put together a great 16x20 storyboard for our wall. I love it. The storyboard is a great peak into our trip. I'm going to love having this on the wall! It's also going to be a new option for printing instead of a canvas, photo float or framed print which I hope I love just as much as the gallery wrapped canvas. Love!

Our kids really do well with traveling. They love new situations, weather conditions, people & just about anything that comes their way. They whine pretty much exactly the same amount they do at home, though it is only during meals on trips. Maybe it's not the normal tasting stuff or something. Or we let them get toooo hungry before we eat. I'm pretty sure it's our fault.

There were so many photos to pick from. I could make at least 5 more of these. Hmmmm, that would make a cool statement on the wall. But no, I really need to do an actual photo shoot of the kids since we have not been following the recommended picture schedule!

Top Row Comments: {1} It was cool to be in some photos on this trip. I love how casual the pic of Maddy with me is. Her little arm looped over mine with a sweet smile. {2} Blake was being... Blake. {3} I was holding the camera to get a pic of Guy & I when Blake got in on the action. They are starting to smile on command for the camera. The whole series of these shots is funny. {4} We both LOVE this photo of Madison playing in the toddler pool.

Upper Middle Row Comments: {1} We were in a cab headed to the beach on Tortola after an hour walk around town. {2} Blake is there fresh from the ships surgical center with three staples in his chin coloring on the bed. {3} The shot of our feet as we're looking off the ship is a similar shot to one we have hanging in the spare bedroom of Guy & I on our first cruise. It also had the life vest with the ship name on it in front of us.

Middle Row Comments: {1} Blake & Maddy descided to say prayers while we were hanging out on deck. {2-3} Madison & Blake in the toddler pool. It's another shot both of us love. {4} The kids looking out at he ocean our first morning.

Bottom Middle Row Comments: {1} Hanging out in the hammock on NCL's private beach. We totally scored a sweet spot that no one else came to for hours. {2} Madison glancing over at Blake while Guy held her. They had been looking out at the ocean together. {3} An upside down boat on Samana, Dominican Republic. If you look closely you can see the trash that covers any spot a human was in contact with on the island. {4} The kids in the ocean with Guy on Tortola.

Bottom Row Comments: {1} Blake on Guy's chest. {2} Guy transporting the twins while I had the carry on's, carseats and smaller bags with the stroller. {3} Madison in Guy's sunglasses while we hung out midday in the lounge during a salsa dancing lesson. {4} Me & my Blakie!

Personal photo day approaches

2010-03-13T23:56:00.000-05:00

I'm so excited to get the cruise pictures done tomorrow & start sharing out story! I have loads of work to do with six sessions to finish or start processing & am definitely excited to get to our personal stuff tomorrow.

Wooo Hooo!

Blake got his staples out yesterday. I told him in the morning he would be getting them out and it would hurt, but not for long. When we were called back into the doctors office he was the first one following her until it came time to walk in the room. It was definitely a procedure room that must have reminded him of the cruise ship's medical facility. He started backing right out. We had him come back in and explained he would be getting his staples out which would hurt. He tearfully & bravely put up with getting him on the table. When the first one came out he cried because of the pain. She said he was doing a good job, to which he said it right back to her with his teary voice & a tear coming out of his eye. He put up with the three staples coming out. She had him wait a couple minutes {getting a cuddle from daddy}, and then had him look up to take a look at the site under his chin. As soon as that was done he basked in the praise dished out & happily went to the sticker drawer down the hall. He really did an awesome job.

Time for bed!

A few Blake & Madison updates & tidbits

2010-03-10T22:56:00.000-05:00

I responded to a Q&A on a popular twin blog called The Foster Family I like to read. It has some info I've wanted to put on my blog so I just copied it here.

When did or will you start potty training? I read somewhere you can potty train a kiddo at 22 months even if they show no interest. We put our twins in undies a week before they turned 22 months 5 weeks ago. It has gone wonderfully with some accidents that get less and less all the time. They are now consistantly telling me when they need to go, able to hold it for a few minutes or more until we get to a potty & have started being comfortable going poo on the potty. This with the last week spent on a cruise with no set schedule and NO potty seat!

* When did or will you move into toddler beds? We switched their cribs to the toddler setting months ago. I think right around 18-19 months.

* What types of activities do you do to entertain your toddler? Our twins entertain themselves a lot. They love puzzles, coloring, blocks, dolls, legos & especially the flash cards. We have a small house they so they can only get out one type of toy at a time. Right now they are good at cleaning up & helping.

* I need some quick/easy toddler meal suggestions! Tortilla with refried beans & cheese folded in half on the stove set to medium high to melt the cheese & crisp the tortilla a bit. Including cool down it only takes 10 minutes. You can also put some tomato & other random stuff in there including chicken, beef, rice and corn which are all tasty. It's also easy to do an adult version with jalapenos, red pepper or salsa at the same time.

* When should we drop the sippy cup? We decided to do this on our cruise last week at 22 months old, when both my hubby and I could be around for damage control during meals. In one week they are pretty good at it! Today I started having cups by me, they have to stand by me while they drink since they are still careless & playful with them.

* How do you handle time outs? We don't call it time out & we decided no counting either. They are told what their choice is & if they don't do it they have to sit. If one does something wrong we tell them sternly to SIT. They know it means they are in trouble and will sit most of the time. I'm thinking this wont work for much longer then we'll reevaluate. My hubby tells them, "I need to talk to you." whenever they are in trouble. The kids are responding really well to him by stopping crying, whining or pouting to listen to what he has to say about their misdeeds.

I have finally consented to let the kids try using forks & spoons more. As a result they are getting better and better at using them! Madison did a fantastic job eating soup by herself one day on the cruise. We also found out on the cruise Blake is definitely a meat person with bacon being his favorite meat of all. We could also coax him to eat many more things with the promise of more bacon.

Madison is little miss independent. I let her push the stroller as we were leaving the airport Saturday afternoon. Despite the fact she cannot see around or over the stroller she did not want me to help her push it up the incline. Just before we left Blake was busy entertaining everyone when he pushed the four wheeler luggage over to me from where Guy pulled it off the bag belt. Since baggage claim for Southwest here in Raleigh is definitely inclined we all watched as he came closer to me in a forward motion with the bag while getting further away sideways because of the incline. He also tipped the bag over a couple of times & did a great job of lifting it back up. Yes, it was definitely the smaller and not super sized version of the four wheeled bag. I'm still impressed with him though.

The kids absolutely loved sharing a bed & being right next to us during the cruise. Now that we are home the last two nights have not gone so well. They have gotten up no less then 5 times each night. Madison was in a complete panic the first night when she woke unable to feel or see Blake & we were also not there. At about 3:20 this morning I was having a dream where Blake was clinging to me like a leach, as it turns out he was. He even dislodged his chin bandaid in his efforts to stay attached to me as I was trying to get him off me in my half sleep. I told him he had to go back to his bed. You would think he was told we were leaving him forever.

Here are some images from our family photo shoot in October. Enjoy! They were taken by my friend, Cindy, of LilyP Studio in Phoenix, AZ.

My sisters, Jessica & Tawni {missing Lin}, my mom & I. Boy do I look like the odd man out with my dark hair & being so much taller!

Having so fun watching Cindy trying to get the kids attention.

Me & my sweet Maddy

Me & the rambunctious Blake

Riley with his mom, my sister, Tawni & my mom

All of us kids being kids.

My mom, Blake & I singing some odd nursery song

Maddy & Guy

Tawni & Riley - Love this shot. Riley is 6 weeks younger then the twins.

My kids were not happy by this point. We being the extra early risers on eastern time were ready and there at least 2 hours before everyone else. Yeah, they melted pretty much right away. Poor Riley is is looking back to us for help being sandwiched between the two sookie la las.

Here they calmed down a bit. {It's amazing how much they have changed in the last few months. Heck, they use the potty now!}

Cousins. I'm sure we'll have many shots of these two hanging out in the years to come.

Love the light & the fence.

Crazy Blake

Our little family. Love my hair in this shot & how into doing our own thing we are.

So sweet

Madison will cherish this shot when she gets older.

Or maybe she'll cherish this one.

Family fun in the water.

He was getting me soooo wet while Madison was gently walking along in the background.

Love this smile. It's all about the joy.

The details bring back all the other details of the day.

My kids. We so rarely get them in the same picture.

This just may be my favorite shot! Love the water droplets being in focus capturing the activity & excitement of the moment.

Drool baby. I think one day she will wake up after cuddling with her new husband to a pool of drool on his shoulder. lol This girl is forever drooling. She now manages to do it every time she goes poop on the potty too.

They had completely lost it by this time way worse then the shot above. We are both actively trying to bring them around to happy again.

This is as happy as they got. I love it. There is Guy's open mouth, the fingers in Blake's mouth & the tongue sticking out of her mouth. Me? Happy to be there!

If you made it this far, congratulations! I'll be posting about our cruise soon.

Doctors/Little Moments/Weigh In

2010-02-26T22:33:00.000-05:00

My quest to lose 8 pounds in 10 days is almost complete. I'll weigh in for the last time upon waking tomorrow morning. As of this morning I lost 4.8 pounds which makes me very happy!

It was time for me to get a complete physical. It's been a long time. When I called to make my appointment you could have knocked me over with a feather that it would be two different appointments. Ahh, the signs that tell you age is creeping up faster then you could ever imagine. No more quick semi naked visits to the doctor for me. Now its extra blood work, x-ray, EKG, Totally naked & much longer visits. The good news is my blood work, x-ray & EKG all came back great! My cholesterol is actually low even with all the chips & salsa I eat... :-) My visit yesterday started off before I even went. Upon getting ready to leave I saw that my legs hadn't been shaved for way to long. So into the shower I went. At the office the nurse talked to me for a while. She is sweet if super smelly {heavy smoker}. Then it was time to get undressed. I like to keep my socks on. It just feels better for some reason. The doc came in and we chatted. He went back out to get the nurse for the physical part of the exam which cracks me up. As an infertility patient the male doctors never go get a female to come in for the exam. Ha ha. So all checked out well with me. They also did an x-ray on my tail bone that has been hurting for the last six years. If anything is wrong they will call me. My other follow-up call today was to ask me to go in for a baseline mammogram. Dang, I surely am getting old.

It really is the little moments in life that make life so worth every negative thing we go through. For the rest of my days, I'll remember how sweet it is to see my kids get up into our bed just so they can hang out in daddy and mommy's space. They love us.

Madison is clearly enjoying pulling the blanket up while Blake is slyly checking her out.

Those bangs. I'm sooo happy they are almost grown out.

They have switched spots.

He gets more expression-able instead of less as he gets older. I see the 'Class Clown' label in his future.

There is his daddy's smile.

Even though she acts like Blake drives her crazy, she is always looking to him for approval or following him around the house.

I so don't remember what he was laughing at, but love him! Maddy is in her own little world.

Still happily doing his thing. Still in her own little world.

He took off to be cuddly {maybe sit on her face} with Madison.

He is still so happy & she definitely does Not want him to be touching her.

Still no touch.

A minute later after a hug from me.

Now it's her time to play around. He still is doing his happy thing.

Wouldn't it be nice if she actually left her barrettes, bows & rubber bands in her hair.

A little gangsta

I love her lips & deep blue eyes.

Fun times.

A very unedited picture of me with Madison. See the India dot & other red mark are back? The dot between my eyes & red mark on the side of my nose. They are blood vessels at the surface. There is also a pretty good shot of my forehead showing where I'm losing my skin pigmentation. When I get tan the white spots are really noticeable. Who cares! I love that I have pictures with my kids. Hopefully they will like them too. As I tell most of my clients, kids remember you and do not care about any of our imperfections. They love us no matter what.

We are off first thing in the morning for our plane ride to Miami & a fabulous cruise. Woooo Hoooo! I'll be back on when we get back with pictures & stories.

Oh, Blake and Madison were both accident free today and BOTH kids pooped in the potty! Oh yeah... Right on!! Our kids totally Rock!

More January photos & a cool Giveaway!

2010-02-24T10:51:00.000-05:00

My friend, Tabitha, is giving away a $150 gift card to Skin Care Rx! Go enter. Even if I don't win, you might! Tabitha always has beautiful photography, an awesome Sunday Citer {quote} and definitely lives up to her blog title, Fresh Mommy. She's one of the few blogs I make sure to read whenever I am doing my blog reading. I feel like if we met in real life we'd be great friends, and consider her a friend already. Boy could I use the skin care gift card. Really, who couldn't? Everyone needs to take great care of their skin since it's really hard to repair the damage once it's done. My loss of pigmentation speaks for itself. Thankfully, it really shows up clearly/obviously only when I'm tan which I try to avoid.

What's better then monster trucks on TV?

I'm not sure Blake thinks there is much better! The TV picture makes it look like a cartoon which it wasn't. It was also the first of January when we took down the Christmas tree shortly thereafter.

It's a good thing Blake is so cute. This morning he had me taking him to the potty every five minutes for an hour and a half. No exaggeration. He then proceeds to come up to me for the whatever time to saying, "Poop!" Only this time he had already gone in his pants. WHAT!!!! Talk about frustration. Mine, but probably his too. They are doing so good overall. I think it's the impending trip coupled with my lack of time to get any of my photography work done that made me so over the top frustrated.

After talking to Guy, who is working 12.5 hours today, he will take charge of the kids after work so I can get some work done.

Tomatoes are yummy!

These were my favorite pj's on Maddy. Too bad she grew out of them already.

Approval for taking the last two, maybe?

They will eat tomatoes every day.

This cracked me up! I looked into Madison's little catsup bowl for her baked fries to find the little girl with a swim suit on. LOL It's perfect.

Sing it: I'm leaving on a jet plane... don't know when I'll be back again....

2010-02-23T08:02:00.000-05:00

The pictures do not go along with the text. They are from our trip to Marbles Children's Museum in Raleigh a few weeks ago. I've loaded a TON of new pictures up to make it a bit easier to blog on the fly. Most of the time it's the pictures that take me the longest to get ready.

We just got our pictures back from our October photo shoot. My photographer friend had nothing but computer problems the past few months. I'm hoping to work on them in the next couple days so I can share them with my family & on here! The kids were really tired and hungry by the time we got to our little family pictures, but there are a few gems.

The kids are so cute. Last night they were playing in the living room. Madison was sitting on top of the slide with Blake standing below at the bottom. He got right up to the edge & climbed just on the bottom. Madison went down. They thought it was hilarious. When they noticed us looking at them with parental love {amusement}, they decided they needed to give us a show. They started giggling, hugging and rolling around on the floor. At one point they were laying next to each other on their side/bellies with their faces almost nose to nose and each had an arm over the others back. We loved it.

Guy is a genius! He has spent some time online in the past few months trying to find me a cruise we can afford. Well, last week he found us one, and we leave on Saturday!

I think it's the perfect remedy for our little families recent emotional trials. Sure, we could use that for another fertility cycle, but it just might not work. Remember, it took us almost five years and at least $20,000.00 to get the kids. We both feel really good about the size of our family. Sometimes, I feel a bit bummed about us not adding to the family. One thing that's helped is to stop being a part of a twin message board online. While it was fun to give advice it was making me a little crazy since almost all the posts were by the pregnant women. I have a great network of friends with multiples the same age as mine & some who are a bit ahead. There are also a few preggo friends I've made recently who I'm excited to get to know better. Photographing the little ones is definitely no biggie. When that work cap goes on my brain is really all about how to work the magic. Besides, who doesn't love to hold a new baby?!?!

Life really is what we make it. That doesn't mean we don't go through trials & experience sorrow. For us there are so many other things to focus on at any time, we don't dwell on those things that will bring us down. We've also prayed to know our family is good like it is. Both of us have received peace & comfort from these prayers.

Do you think it's possible to lose 8 pounds in 10 days without decreasing your food intake? This is how much notice I've had to bring us to cruise day. I'm on day 4 with pretty much no results despite working out almost every day at least 3 times. Every day has had one work out for sure with most having 3. With the fertility cycle and the month of eating to excess the month after I've put on 8 pounds. No fitting in a swim suit for me!

Luckily, even if my efforts do not pay off Lands End had a spectacular sale on their overstocked slimming swim suits just for me. The new suit should arrive by Thursday. I've wanted one ever since hearing about them. My friend, Allison, has the most darling full coverage swim suit which convinced me that a full coverage suit {no tummy and a skirt on the suit} does not need to look like a granny suit even in all black. Maybe it's because she is so cute, but it will certainly be more comfortable. My thoughts are if I feel more comfortable then I'll be more confident thus appearing better regardless if the suit really helps or not! Isn't confidence supposed to be more attractive then real beauty anyway?

Both Madison and Blake are doing really well at potty training. We couldn't be more happy with them. This evening Guy was cleaning up something while I was on the elliptical. I turned to see what the kids were doing in the bathroom he had left them in. Madison must have indicated she needed to potty because they teamed up to get her pants and undies off for her to climb up to the big potty. She announced to Guy when he returned {upon me yelling to him he had to see what they were doing} she had gone pee pee. They are so good. We have some accidents. They are mostly still poop, though Blake does most of his in the potty now. Blake also gets busy living live and doesn't think about needing to go until it's too late. Madison is starting to get really good at announcing to us when she needs to go pee.

Maddy is also learning the need to go pee will get her out of things like finishing her food, cleaning up toys, being in trouble & Blake pestering her. For now I humor her each time, and hopefully she will learn those things will all still be waiting for her to finish when she is done on the potty.

Are you totally wondering about the cruise details? Since most of my readers are my Facebook friends you most likely already know most of it. We will be leaving out of Miami & stopping at four fabulous Eastern Caribbean destinations over the course of 7 days. This includes a stop at the famous pirate spot of Tortola! We are looking forward to the clear blue water, white sands & yummy food. The kids are getting really excited & have loved the YouTube videos of ships blowing their horns Guy has shown them. They loved the Disney {we are not going Disney} one the best as it does the famous Disney tune. The bags are almost packed, snacks are purchased & potty training is good enough.

We are almost outta here!

Updating

2010-02-13T00:04:00.000-05:00

Life is going very well here at the White House.

The photos in this post are from a day back in December when Blake {assisted by Madison}opened and tried to empty out almost all of the baby wash & lotion we had. He also broke a light bulb that was hidden in the back of the cabinet. Luckily the sink is shaped in a way the bottles only lost a little bit since all were in there pointed up. of the 12-18 bottles he only managed to completely empty 2.

We are still potty training. Hey, they are young so I wasn't expecting perfection, even though that would have been nice. Madison ran a fever last night and this morning. We think it might have been brought on by constipation. Yes, really. She didn't go for almost two days because we stopped letting them wear diapers at nap time. We were also very vigilant about getting her on the potty often not giving her a chance to poop in her undies. She got us today though by sneaking off to drop a bomb in her undies. She definitely does not let us know when she has the urge to go & says no whenever we ask her if she needs to. I'm getting really good at knowing when she does so she has only had once accident in the last two days. Blake did great going poop in the potty twice in the last three days. He has started to have a few accidents as the newness of going in the potty has worn off. He gets to playing and goes without thinking.

I've had about one session per week since the beginning of the year which is quite impressive in this slow season. I'm hoping that translates to being fully booked once spring hits for real. There are actually a couple of weeks already booked out in the spring. My senior reps are almost all lined up, and they are all great kids {almost adults}. If you know any great kids about to be high school seniors not attending West Johnston please let me know. I'm still looking for a few more in the next week or so for the sessions on February 27th.

Poor Madison is having a hard time sleeping tonight with her waking up every 20 minutes the last hour and a half {hence why I am not in bed}. Speaking of not sleeping, Blake still gets muscle cramps at night waking himself and Guy or I up for 10-70 minutes 2 or more nights a week. Guy says he remembers getting leg cramps often as a kid. Poor little dude.

We did a major switcharoo in our house. I'm loving it! When we got married we talked about never having a TV in our bedroom. Upon moving into our small home we had two large TV's and only one living/family room. We put the TV in our room that turned out to be a life saver after the twins were born. It pooped out on us after a few months and now lives happily in the garage. However, I never used our fantastic elliptical machine with no mindless TV to keep my mind of the minutes ticking slowly by. We discussed putting it in the living room before always agreeing it would look ugly. Guy mentioned the other day it really would be convenient to have it in the living room. So yesterday I started with the kids room.

I moved their beds, the dresser and the bookshelf to different spots. The recliner went in front of the window & the love-seat went into the kitchen temporarily. Guy woke up in time to help me move the living room love-seat into the kids room, the elliptical into the living room, the love-seat from the kids room into our room & some miscellaneous things around as well. We then decided the recliner would fit in the living room for more seating. I love it!!! The toys are now out of the living room & the kids room looks like a kids room instead of a baby room. We had to do the love-seat switcharoo the way we did to get the matching couches into our room.

Both of the kids are now regularly speaking in short sentences. They can both say their ABC's and count from 1-10 by themselves though never in front of an audience. I guess they will not be performers. They can hop and jump, follow simple directions, clean up without being asked, put their dirty clothes in the laundry, use an adult fork with some proficiency and operate the fridge water dispenser :-(. They have a basic understanding about most topics I discuss with them. They love showers & brushing their teeth. Madison has a love hate relationship with hair ties, bows, bands & ribbons. They love to assign ownership of every item they see, i.e. Daddy's, Bake's, Madiii's & Mommy's. Every time Madison sees the phone she wants to call Nana {she says the same, Nana, for all the grandmas but knows each well}. Madison is officially a 3T girl though we still cram her in some 2T's until winter is over. Blake happily catches up to her in height for about one day before she grows again keeping more often then not a 1/2 inch of height on him. His legs are a bit shorter letting him still fit into his 2T pants. His shirts are definitely a 3T though.

He looks so remorseful, doesn't he?

Potty Trainers R Us

2010-02-09T23:24:00.000-05:00

We shut the door when we put them to bed.

Two nights ago I heard a ruckus & decided to give them a few before going in to investigate. Well, it got worse so I went in. After pushing the door a little there was something blocking it. I told the kids to move. Nope, it wasn't them.

The door was blocked by a blanket. I pushed it out of the way and the next thing to catch my eye was a diaper, then another diaper. We have been putting them to bed in diapers. Then I saw pajamas. Oh, and more pajamas.

I turned on the light to see my two very naked kids huddled together in the middle of the room with their socks still on, and Blake began pointing towards the blanket yelling, "POOPY!" There was no poopy, thankfully, but there was a ton of pee on the blanket & floor. :-)

I'm thinking my pretty much pee trained, Blake, had to go and did something about not going in his diaper. I'm sure his sister had to help him strip down & undo his diaper since she is very good at this skill.

This photo was taken in December. Yes, I am that far behind. However, I have figured out some very cool things with my Lightroom program that even publishes my photos with a watermark directly to my Flikr account. OH YEAH!!!

Two days ago Madison had no accidents at all & did a gargantuan {most stinky poop of all time} poop in her nap time diaper. Yesterday, however, she hasn't made it to the potty once. The jury is still out on if she is ready. I'll give her a few more days of this before deciding.

Blake went poop in his potty this morning!!! I was so excited for him. Madison had a couple accidents this morning. I was totally losing hope, but then she had none from nap time on. Go Madison!

We have successfully been out of the house accident free three times now. The first time was for four hours to attend church on Sunday. Blake went in the big potty at church while Madison held it the entire time. The second was to our neighbors house for 2 hours yesterday when Guy had to head to work & I was at a photo shoot. The third was for a speed shopping trip to Wal-Mart tonight.

Overall I am super pleased with how well the kids are doing. They are almost 22 months which is early, especially in the multiples world.

What will tomorrow bring?

All of it...

2010-01-30T22:33:00.001-05:00

If you haven't heard yet, we did not get pregnant. More about that later.

A couple of weeks ago I was sitting in the recliner watching the kids go to sleep. It was a partially sunny day with those perfect puffy clouds drifting by. The room would get dimmer then brighter as they passed, and I could hear the sound of the breeze in the trees. Days like this always stick in my mind. They are my idea of the perfect day no matter what the temperature. There is a sense of peace, happiness & love conveyed to my mind and body on these days. I hope my kids will feel these feelings and memory triggers as they go through life.

Blake has been in the 70-80 percentile whenever we go the doctors from about 4 months on. He is definitely big for his age, but not ginormous like Madison {generally 100%}. What he does have are massive hands! Thick chunky long fingers with a wide palm. It's like when you see a large breed puppy with his huge paws. I wonder if Blake will be quite tall despite his only slightly above average growth chart. For sure I'd say he'll be 6 foot. Other then looking so much like Guy in the face, he reminds me a lot of my mom's father. It's things like his head shape, those strange looking toes, and his build with a little of his crazy personality thrown in. My grandpa was the kind of guy who hung out in his boxer shorts on those hot Arizona summer days. He wouldn't care who was coming over they were welcome into his home while he lounged around in his boxers watching sports. He was always slim, funny & interesting. My grandma tells the story of how she first met him at Tempe beach park next to the Salt River standing near the road watching him careen around the corner on two wheels. He pursued my gorgeous 6' tall grandmother with all his energy. Blake seems to have his energy and thirst for life.

My January was spent with the single minded focus of becoming pregnant. We thought it would work along with pretty much everyone else. I think we thought by doing the exact same type of fertility cycle we did to get the twins we would be successful despite it having taken almost 5 years to get pregnant with the twins. I do know I probably would not have had any yearly exams or even insurance if it wasn't for us trying. Wednesday I'll be going in to check out the polyp to confirm its existence & set up a surgery date. All of this has also inspired me to get a physical too. When did I get so old my physical involves TWO appointments, x-rays, & an EKG in addition to blood work, pap & a physical exam? Wow, it is a bit crazy getting old enough for all of this. Once the surgery is complete and the physical goes perfectly I'll be all ready to drop my insurance that costs $50o per month {yes, just for me}, has a high deductible & large copays.

We decided prior to trying for another baby it would be our last attempt due to the cost and emotional aspect. Of course, I knew if it didn't work I'd be ready to change my mind and try again. Guy assured me he was definitely not going to change his mind if it didn't work. When we found out we weren't pregnant by the very definite start of my period we were both sad. I was glad to have some time alone as it was after the kids went to bed & guy hadn't returned from his trip. Everyone knows Guy is a 'Do it now' when you think of it kind of person, but I can also be this way from time to time. After having a day to process our failure it was time to clear out all the stuff we had been saving for our next child. Guy let me know he wasn't ready for me to do that. I don't know if this means he'll change his mind about trying after my surgery is complete or if he just needs more time to process our loss.

I do think of it as a loss. Our kids are each unique individuals who bring so much joy, mischief, love, interest, peace & anger {basically they add it all!} to our lives. We would have welcomed the opportunity to meet another of our Heavenly Father's children into our lives to experience all they had to offer. This is what I feel we have lost. This opportunity to meet another unique individual & be a part of his or her life on this earth. Ever since realizing I actually wanted children as an adult {definitely did not prior to being an adult} 3 felt like a perfect number. It still does, but I am also very happy with our 2. Being a mom has turned out to be way cooler then in my imagination.

I'm not sure if Blake has a mean streak or if he does these things our of exuberance. With Madison it is definitely out of anger. With other people & their kids I really think {hope} it is him not knowing his own strength. He does show signs of great compassion & loves to make people feel better when they are sad or upset. When he pets a dog it's pretty much like he's taking a swing at it in an attempt to pet. Whenever he has injured a fellow child/baby it is only when no one is watching. This frustrates me to no end. I certainly do not want to be the parent of 'The Bully'. Who does. Check out poor Riley's face below. She got her wounds the day before when we hung out at their house. The photos are at Marbles kids museum in Raleigh.

On another note. Madison's hair is getting longer finally. The bangs are now about an inch from being easily tucked behind her ears. YAY! She will let me put her hair up or back, but only for about half of a day. So most of the time it's hanging in her eyes right now. And I actually like it that way. There is just something so impish & not so put together about it. Adorable. The mirrors were a lot of fun. The shot of me with the distorted face & the kids in the background all blurry & dreamy looking is so cool.

Madison's face scratches are from Blake too. Sigh...

Join the fun!

2010-01-23T23:13:00.002-05:00

Become a fan of my new Lifelong Impressions Facebook fan page. AND if 600 fans join by February 6th I'll be giving away a free session to one of the lucky fans by random drawing to take place by the end of February 2010. In the first 15 minutes of going live 8 fans already joined! I think we'll be able to make it! Spread the word. I can't wait to see you all over there.

9 Days after ovulation - Infertility SUCKS!!!

2010-01-23T10:01:00.003-05:00

Here's an oldie but goodie picture of Madison. It's a little like I feel right now.

I'm sure most of the reason I feel this way is the excess of hormones I'm taking for this fertility cycle. This morning I went to the doctor for possible over stimulation of my ovaries. My tummy is really swollen & I look 4 months pregnant. He took a look to find only a few small cysts in each ovary. No biggie. He said the swelling and discomfort was most likely from the excess progesterone hormone I am on. While doing the ultrasound he saw what looks like a polyp in my uterus. A polyp is a tree like growth that can do a great job of preventing an embryo from implanting. Not a good thing to see. He said it looks large too. His advice was to come in for a hydro sonogram if we don't get pregnant to confirm it then have it removed.

This new finding really decreases our chances even more. My hopefulness has gone bu-bye. Oh well. I'll be totally and completely shocked if this works for us. If it doesn't we'll just need to be happy with being a family of 4. How much more grateful I am right now we were able to have twins when we successfully got pregnant last time. It was a miracle and continues to bless our lives every day as we experience these two adorable children learning and growing in front of our eyes.

Quick blog update

2010-01-19T23:30:00.002-05:00

My two week wait to see if our fertility treatment worked or not is going by very slowly. It is only day 5 of 14. I know we'll find out soon enough, but the suspense is not so fun. Then if we do get a positive {remember only a 20% chance} we'll have to wait a couple more weeks for an ultrasound to see a heartbeat. Mostly the ultrasound will be to see 'how' successful our cycle is if we get a positive result. Guy is pretty much convinced it didn't work. Maybe it's the fear of adding a third child into our very happy foursome. Four is great. We fit most places, people haven't turned us away from staying at their house on trips. We fit well into our cars & can borrow a normal car on trips. We have very much enjoyed being a foursome. I think most people panic a little when going for an extra kid & they can actually be pregnant with no turning back.

It's been lovely outside with super awesome temperatures. We had a spectacular sunset with a rainbow I couldn't even fit into my wide angle camera frame. The kids loved it. I started putting short sleeves on the last couple days. Once they go on I almost cry when having to put the long sleeve ones back on with the inevitable return of cold. The same cannot be said when fall brings out the long sleeves for the first time. It is always exciting for me to put the short sleeve ones back on. Oh, and I am dreaming of open toed shoes too!

I have about 5 pairs of good shoes to give away in size 9 1/2 to 10. Let me know if you are interested. My feet are pretty much officially a gargantuan 11 now. Poor me. At least I am tall with monster feet. There is always a positive to anything.

If anyone has some boy shoes in a 7 1/2 or 8 they would like to get rid of we are in need. Blake is now out of his 7's with only one pair of 7 1/2 tennis shoes to wear. No church shoes. I cannot get myself to lay out $17 for a new pair at Target. Hitting all the resale shops when the need is upon us is usually a waste of time. They never have them when I Need them, but they are always there when it's a size or two ahead. It's been a few months since we went to any resale shops.

Sweet news!

2010-01-13T22:21:00.004-05:00

Today I had my follow up u/s after starting the stimulation shots each night. I can't believe my old little ovaries have performed so well. I have 3-4 eggies ready to go! So today I gave myself the shot to make me ovulate. That is a few days faster then I thought it would be. Crazy. The follicles surrounding my eggs were nice and big too. There was a 21mm, 17.5mm, 17mm and a 'maybe' follie at 14mm. This means I will ovulate tomorrow sometime and begin the two week wait to test. Only two weeks until we find out if all this worked.

Oh, and the coolest part about being ready so quickly. The $300 in meds I would have had to order today is not necessary!!! I also don't have to go back to the doctor unless I get a positive pregnancy test. Nice.

We still really only have about a 20% chance of this resulting in a pregnancy. Also, each of those 3-4 eggs only has a 20% chance of becoming a baby. We definitely still need those prayers right now that this will work for us.

Lifelong Impressions is alive and well!!! ha ha

2010-01-12T10:16:00.003-05:00

S&G Photography is no longer a dual branded business. It is now Lifelong Impressions! Check out my new website and blog looks. Do you love the difference as much as I do? Let me know!!!

Progress

2010-01-10T23:16:00.002-05:00

Tonight was my 3rd night of shots. It's already seeming to fly by, but then we aren't at the two week wait to test yet either. Once we get there it will most likely be a different story. Guy and I will work on being 'friendly' with each other. I was thinking about the whole making an appointment basically. Most people say that it isn't a great experience when you have to make baby making an appointment. Really, what is a Honeymoon or Friday night date if not an appointment? People make appointments to get intimate all the time. My next appointment is on Wednesday for an u/s and bloodwork. The u/s will be to look at my ovaries to see what the stimulation drugs are doing to help the follicles develop maturing the eggs. We're hoping to see about 4 good sized ones that will make it to a mature state when we trigger ovulation {another shot for me}. With Blake & Madison we estimate there were 4 mature eggs released. Each egg has about a 20% chance of success which is why we are hoping for 4 to get one baby.

Our cute Blake on his tricycle for the first time Christmas morning.

Products we love

2010-01-10T10:31:00.002-05:00

I've decided to add a new section to this blog called products I love. We aren't like everyone else and make some not so common decisions. Everyone who has tried a product I recommend has LOVED it. This post will be updated often as I post stuff in my normal posts and copy the relevant bits to this post. It will also be linked directly from my top bar.

I'd like to start with two of my favorite products.

Stroller:

Most people end up buying at least strollers before their child is done with them. Why? Because they go for what everyone else does. I really think that's it. If you get a very nice stroller the first time there will be no need to buy another one. Of course, there is buying a one seater then having a second child in a short enough time you need to buy a two seater. Luckily, a very nice stroller also has a very good resale value! Sell it and buy a two seater nice stroller when you are ready. I'm a fan of Baby Jogger. They have strollers with big wheels, great suspension, big covers, adjustable hand bars, easy handling {think 1 finger}, and are super solid. Most of their strollers also come with an add on to fit infant carriers {not sure about the doubles}.

For twins: My opinion is skip the stroller that fits the car seats. They aren't in them for that long & the money would be better spent on a one awesome stroller. Most of the strollers that fit two car seats are pretty flimsy overall and hard to push when the conditions are not perfect. We got the Baby Jogger City Series double and have been using it since the twins were born. It's been a dream. Most of the other twins moms I know have purchased at least one additional stroller after the first. We feel purchasing the City Double has been cost effective overall. We have used it in all weather conditions, all terrain & traveled with it extensively. It handles like a dream and glides along. LOVE IT! We got ours new on Ebay for $400. This side by side stroller also fits through all standard doorways.

High Chair:

We love the Fischer Price Space Saver. It fits anywhere, is sturdy & converts to a booster. We started using them when the babies were about 2-3 months for bottle feedings. It transitioned well to first foods with it's reclined positions. Most of the time we used the chairs on the floor. We took them with us to restaurants when they weren't big enough to fit into the high chairs provided. The kids felt like they were part of the group instead of an infant seat on the floor/sling or in the stroller. The two seats easily fit base to base with the handles making one handle making them easy to carry. We took them to friends houses & still do. Try Thanksgiving with no kids on your lap! Currently we have them converted to boosters on bar stools at the counter. The kids love to watch me make their food & snack on the healthy things I put in front of them they wouldn't eat if they were on a plate with the rest of their food {Thanks Jessica Sienfeld! I don't like many of the recipies, but that tip alone was worth it}.

Rushing, Hurting & Lost

2010-01-08T22:56:00.002-05:00

That surely doesn't sound like a very positive title! Really it's not all that bad.

Tuesday night had a very long session of getting rid of Blake's most recent Charlie Horse around 11:00pm. Madison was also upset the entire 35 minutes I was massaging his leg trying to lay on my moving arms, lap or wherever she could get her whinny self onto me. As soon as the pain subsided Blake was ready to go to sleep. Madison was good and upset for the slight of not being able to properly cuddle her while tending to Blake. It wasn't until I lost my patience at 1:00 am and yelled at her that, I NEEDED her to get into her own bed and not make a peep because she was asleep. Madison took about 2 minutes while cuddling on my lap/shoulder to tell me, "Yes" she would do that. What not even two year old gets all that, makes up her mind & then does it? Strange girl.

I didn't sleep well the night before last. Even though I was all set and ready to head to bed at 10:30 it was somehow midnight when my head hit the pillow. At 4:00 am both kids were wide awake with Madison not so happy to be woken up with super chipper brother who knows how to turn the light on. It took about 30 minutes to get him back to sleep {she was out in 2-3}. However, I was still not really having my cycle begin like it should & started worrying my appointment was made too quickly. There went another 45 minutes of missed sleep over that. Poor Guy about lost his head when he got home at 5:00am and left the kids door open after checking on them. I wanted them happily playing in their room for a while since I didn't get enough sleep.

My cycle finally started a bit more just prior to my appointment. Enough that she didn't make me come back today for another ultra sound {from now on u/s}. My ovaries looked great with little atrial follicles starting to develop. Follicles are what grow around an egg to mature it in preparation for it to release upon ovulation. Most cycles a woman will have several follicles start to mature with only one released at ovulation. Fraternal twins which occur in about 1 out of 250 pregnancies occur when more then one egg is released. Recent studies are showing much higher rates of twin pregnancies then professionals ever suspected because more doctors offices are doing early pregnancy u/s between 7-10 weeks. Many twin pregnancies end up as one if one twin does not make it early on. Anyway, sorry about the side track. My uterine 'stripe' as Reproductive Endocrinologists {RE} call it looked pretty thick. Since I hadn't really gotten a good flow yet that was to be expected. She gave the go for my cycle.

Today I gave myself the first shot in the stomach. Since we are not doing the insemination at the RE's office I moved the shot time to 4pm instead of 6pm as the 6pm is so the insemination can be timed right. 4:00 pm works better for me as Guy will always be around to make sure I don't space giving myself a shot at exactly the right time.

My friend, Lisa, who so kindly agreed to come with me to the doctors was great company. She asked if it would be OK to stop by the home school store to buy Kailyn a new math workbook. Yep, no worries. We drove to find her nearest bank who had a monster line to get through. Then we decided to go by the company to pick up my www.babyhopes.com order of PreSeed & a few cheap pregnancy tests. What happened next is pure funky. We called the office to get directions as neither of us knew the town of Morrisville very well. She was put on hold right away and mentioned the lady was not all there. After talking to her for the next five minutes to try and get directions she was put on hold for another 3-4 minutes. Lisa said the lady really didn't sound all there. "A dingbat?" I asked. "Yep!" Hmmmm, we should have tried another way right then. Instead we got some directions after another 5 minutes. We got on the road and started following them. Lisa realized looking at the directions she wrote down they was no way they were right. She called back only to get the dingbat again. She clarified the directions. Twenty minutes later we were almost exactly back where we started after making a giant circle. The last six miles back to origin we were stuck with no turn around! We called her husband, Travis, to find out she was trying to make us turn onto a street {name change} that was the same street in the opposite direction right where we turned onto the street we were on. He could not find our destination street in any of the mapping programs he looked at. Ughhh. So since she told us it was right off that street we headed all the way back and down the correctly named street. After leaving the town by a couple miles we decided that can't be right and called back. They told us it was off the other named side of the street. Well then why in the world did that dingbat even mention the other named side? This means we passed their location TWICE. Yes, twice. It also means it was only 10 minutes from our original location. It took 50 minutes from the start of the first phone call to the moment I walked in the door. They should have given me a $5 discount. Instead the very competent lady they had working there who just arrived {oh I wish she had come in early to give us directions} listened to my frustration nicely. She could have offered me a bit of a discount, but instead she nicely said, "Hmmmm, didn't get directions before you left." Well, no I had two rough nights & not enough time to do it before we left for my appointment. Next time I'll be sure to print directions or have the GPS with me. That's for sure!

By the way, PreSeed is a sperm friendly product to help with conception. Women have natural cervical fluid that supports sperm the most right at ovulation. With this product you can use it several days earlier since sperm life up to five days increasing the chances of pregnancy & a girl if you are so inclined. Am I repeating myself? It feels like I've said this before, but I often 'write' posts in my head that are never posted.

Tonight was my first shot. It didn't hurt at all going in. It didn't hurt administering it. The injection site did hurt a little later on though. I don't remember it hurting at all unless I hit a vein last time. Maybe it's my tiredness.

The light at the end of tunnel just might be a darling newborn like this! Our friends, Rich and Allison, welcomed this little sweetie into their family last week. I got to spend 3 hours with them on Tuesday photographing their family. There are too many great shots to pick a favorite. This one is showing off the newest prop I made which is called a stork pouch.

Happy New Year

2010-01-05T00:01:00.002-05:00

Happy New Year, everyone!!!

I have a great post half finished. Part of the reason is so many things keep happening I'd like to add. The other part is any spare moment is dedicated to designing the new website, blog, shopping cart & attacking the redo of all our paperwork. Those cute design helps for great wall displays in your home will also be offered as packages in the shopping cart to make like really easy! Love it!

Our friends just had a baby boy I get to photograph tomorrow. It will be my youngest newborn session yet at only 5 days old. The younger the better! In honor of his birth I made a cool new stork pouch with a picture off the internet and a knitting ring. Give me a pattern and it will be a failure. Give me a photo, memory, idea or item in person and I can make it. How weird is that. I really don't even know how to knit and did it! OK, so it was finished off with crochet since I had no idea how to get it off the ring and finished.

It's now a waiting game for my cycle to start so we can begin our fertility treatment. The gamble on waiting to order my meds until today paid off. I ordered about 1/2 the drugs I need which set us back about $200. One drug they prescribe I've never had to use and our out of pocket cost alone is $300. I decided to hold off on it so we can get a better guess as the time gets closer. Then if they want me to take it I can get it the next day. You know, going at this a second time after being sucessful {having Blake & Madison}, I find the road much easier to navigate. There isn't this HUGE learning curve there was the first 5 years.

I've also lined up a friend for going to the doctor with me. Since my appointments will be me getting a vaginal ultra sound it would be hard {try almost impossible} for me to take them by myself. Yeah, I don't think they would appreciate me trying to take them into the room with me! Though really, if it came down to it, I would take them and darn those docs anyway if they didn't wanted to treat me with them in tow.

My son... What a stinker

2009-12-29T20:41:00.002-05:00

At our church we are often asked to serve in what we call a Calling. There are no paid positions so every person who does anything has been asked to volunteer. Whenever a position is in need of someone the Bishop and his counselors will decide who they feel will best fit the position which is confirmed by prayer. One of them will then ask a person to serve in a specific way, and the person will accept or deny the request. Once they have accepted the 'call' they are announced in our Sacrament meeting. Part of this announcement includes the person standing while they ask for the members support of the person in the calling by raising their hands. They also ask if there is anyone opposed. After this is taken care of the person is then able to serve in the capacity they were called such as a teacher, organizational leader, missionary, & many other positions.

I was asked to teach in our Primary program. Primary is for kids 18 months to 11 years. I've often been asked to teach the kids and absolutely love it. I usually get the 18 month to 4 year old crowd. This time I think I'll get the 6ish kids, but I'm waiting to hear from our Primary President {we're on day 3 of phone tag}.

On Sunday my name was called along with two other people who had recently been asked and accepted serving in a calling. He asked for the members to support us in our callings. Then he asked if anyone was opposed. Blake raised his hand up as high as it would go! ha ha

I guess he wants me to be around in case he just doesn't feel like going to his Primary class! He also heard everyone say Amen after a prayer and started saying Amen a few times extra loud. Cute little copy cat.

In a Madison note. She has been a big like a record stuck on one line with her ABC's song. We asked her to please sing a different song. After a minute or so we heard her in the back seat singing Ba Ba Black Sheep. Love it!

Both kids can now jump with their feed actually leaving the floor.

It's only about a week away until we are back on the fertility train. People keep asking my if we don't want to have any more kids because I sound so glum when mentioning us doing it or it is almost here. Well, dang it, it's a stinky emotional roller coaster of hormonal yuk! There is nothing to look forward to even with my mostly optimistic life outlook. The first emotional hurdle is timing ordering the meds. I want to do it in January so it uses my deductible up with the new insurance period just in case we decide to try again should it fail as the prescription deductible is $200. A good chunk of savings should we need to use it. The problem with this is the 1st is a holiday and the 2-3rd are the weekend. This means the first day I can order is on the 4th for delivery on the 5th. My cycle could start as early as Monday meaning I'll be totally stressing with my shots supposed to start on Tuesday or Wednesday! It's not like you can delay taking the shots either. You have to start at the right time on the right day of your cycle for it to work right. Waiting another month would only add to this emotional antipathy of the moment which I'd really like the time between now and our pregnancy test to zooom zoooom zooom by. Mostly I keep talking to myself about staying upbeat & letting the chips fall where they may.

Oh, and I'm getting my new logo tomorrow! It will take me a little bit to incorporate it into all of our forms, marketing materials, the website, blog & new vinyl for the cars. Once it is all ready to roll out you will know with my plastering it all over EVERYTHING. I've also really had a brain wave of what photography means to me and how it applies to the busiess not only for myself but for all clients. It's like turning on the switch of expressing what this is really all about and defining the business. My promo shots are also super cool. One of them is my current Facebook picture. If you aren't my friend or an S & G Photography fan click on Friend & S & G Photography to become one.

Merry Christmas!!!

2009-12-24T19:14:00.001-05:00

Merry Christmas everyone!

This was a fabulous Christmas for us. My parents & little sister, Gracie, were able to come visit for three days. Our kids were ubber excited for the constant entertainment of company. The kids thoroughly enjoyed the free for all of Christmas morning. My sister kindly helped me out by taking some {OK a ton} of pictures of me to use for the photography business. We laughed a lot, ate a lot & relaxed a lot. I feel like our yummy Christmas dinner made itself with three of us booty to booty in our tiny kitchen getting it done.

To make the gifts offer as much opening pleasure we took them out of their original boxes and created more boxes for the kids. I think it was a great idea. Not only did the kids get to open more gifts, but there were no funky box openings to get through before playing with them! Madison and Blake definitely loved the tricycles. A babydoll stroller was definitely on our must purchase list. It was a huge hit!

We even took the kids to see a movie with us today. They did really well overall & Guy only missed about 20 minutes of the movie. Watching them sit there eating popcorn {yep they love it as much as I do! No butter} was like getting to see a double feature at the same time.

Here is a funny picture we found when we were searching for some family photos this week. It was taken about this time last year.

The Blakester

2009-12-20T21:25:00.002-05:00

Our shorty. He's generally about 1/2 inch shorter then Madison. He is the super fast kid who can climb up anything, and figures out how things work very quickly.

He's decided he loves puzzles and flash cards. Both are up high on the dresser shelves & he begs me to get them down or tries to climb up himself.

At Thanksgiving we put up the Christmas tree. My brother in law, Sam, was helping me to put up the tree and took a break to call my sister. He left behind a pile of fragile bulbs on the floor in front of the tree. Blake saw him putting the ornaments on, and he decided to take each bulb and gently stack them up on the lower branches. It looked like a stack of cannon balls {it's the only analogy I could think of}! Ever since then he has had a firm belief the ornaments belong on the tree. He'll walk up to them and make them swing a little then stand and watch for a while.

When Blake has his puffy jacket on he can barely move his head & has no neck in the carseat. It's so funny. Today on the way home from church I was feeding them some fig newtons to keep them awake. At one point Blake slightly turns his head toward me, looks away, back at me, gives a raised eyebrow and then looks out the window. For some reason it just cracked me up.

A little note about Madison. She LOVES to sing. Her singing time teacher, Kim Jensen, pulled Guy aside today to let him know she sings along with every song and does the hand motions. Even if she doesn't know the words the girl is happily singing along. I love it.

Snow? - maybe but not likely to stick around

2009-12-18T22:04:00.002-05:00

My parents are going to come visit for Christmas! I'm so excited to see them again. They are probably more excited to see the kids again {totally fine with me}. When talking to my step mom a few days ago to see what they would like to eat on Christmas day, she said anything was fine wouldn't mind having Chinese food. Yum, I love the local Chinese take out place. They make a great Mongolian beef. We'll probably be a bit more traditional and make a honey glazed ham. Yum to that too.

She definitely got my taste buds going for some tasty Chinese take out. Guess what I had for dinner tonight? That's right. My tasty Mongolian beef.

Madison and Blake were on one today. Seriously, they tried to make sure every last nerve was rubbed raw. Guy got a small taste of it after his work today. He agreed they were out to get us. Not really, but they had a tough day. It must be hard to be 20 months old & your little brain exploding with all the things you are learning.

I'm not sure they ate enough today despite eating non stop. It started with dry cereal, banana, yogurt with blueberries, raisins, pretzels, & fig newtons. They also had cheese crisp, carrots, banana, chicken fried rice, animal crackers, cherries, some kind of Christmas bar & about 14 ounces of whole milk each. I bet they put on some weight the next few days in preparation for adding some height. Blake surprised me tonight when his jammies were kind of tight and almost to short.

We have one more item to buy for the kids Christmas presents. Amazon has been really good to us! I love their super saver shipping {Free.99}. Target has a great price on a complete doll set with all the cool accessories. It even includes a stroller. Every single place we go the kids are all over the baby doll stroller. It's going to be so fun to see them open their gifts on Christmas morning. They have NO IDEA what is about to come their way!

Christmas card 5

2009-12-12T22:44:00.003-05:00

My mom loves kids. Loves them. She's always been known as the person who can put any baby to sleep. Babies just love cuddling with her and feeling her sweet spirit. Every friend I've run into again after years apart asks how my mother is withing the first few catch up questions.

Merry Christmas from my mom & the twins!

Now that we live far away in North Carolina it's so strange to me that my friends do not know my mother. Not at all. Yep, still weird.

Today Madison was all about saying, "I did it" or "You did it." She yells it very excitedly whenever she or we deserve the praise.
Blake was all about doing a board puzzle. He did it many times. He also recognizes when he doesn't pronounce a word correctly & will work on it until he says it right.
They have started holding hands a lot now. I'm not sure if this started when we played Ring Around the Rosie or when we all held hands in a line to check the mail {I thought the man driving by waiving excitedly at us was going to die from the absolute cuteness of our idyllic look}.

Today was a seriously cold day. Wow, was it cold. Like 22 degrees when I headed out to my early morning session. They were all freezing as we did most of the shots outside. The teens were both wearing short sleeve shirts! Oh, but it was so beautiful out. There is something really cool about morning light.

Some friends of mine need prayers right now. Their family has been blessed by a sweet miracle baby who is having a really hard time right now. He is documenting baby Ella's journey with a blog. Please pray that baby Ella will be able to get well enough to head home to her families care. Her big brother and sister would love to have her home for them to help take care of her instead of far away in the hospital. Ella's story can be found here. This awesome & loving family lost their infant son last year who was only 1 month older then the twins. I'm praying they do not lose another baby. Please join me {I know many of you already are and knew about Ella long before I did this week}.

Christmas card 4

2009-12-11T23:06:00.002-05:00

Happy Friday! We all had a good day here in the super frozen South. Really, the super frozen temps are now until midday tomorrow. Oh, it will be time to layer my clothes for my early morning shoot tomorrow. I hope they layer their clothes too so they are warm and happy. Happy is good.

Madison figured out how to blow her nose today. Oh my that is hilarious. I've been talking a lot about Madison lately, but our Blake is definitely a rock star. My favorite word he says right now is 'Butsss' or bus as you & I would say it. Three days ago I got out all the legos. They hadn't shown much interest in them until that day. We cleared off the entire coffee table and the three of us sat there playing. I made them several structures & arches & a ton of towers. Then I showed them how they could drive their cars in and around them. Mostly they had fun taking apart my hard work. Since we put the bucket back in their toy corner Blake has made sure to have soem legos out. He makes a long scepter, as Guy calls it, and carries it around with him. He'll take it apart completely then build a new one to carry around for a while. The kid loves to know how things work and likes things put together after he takes it apart.

Front

Inside spread

Back

Hope you are almost ready for Christmas and feeling the Christmas spirit!

Christmas card 3

2009-12-10T22:00:00.002-05:00

I have no idea why I picked this photo except it looks so perfect to me! lol I think it's the perfect question mark for the quote.

OK, from certain angles I see why some people think they look so much alike.

For those of you who do not read my photography blog here is your warning there are some more pictures of our family on there you will not see here. Check it out! We also aren't very busy right now so any referrals of your friends are extra appreciated! I also might be able to work in a couple extended family shoots when you are all gathered together for Christmas. Let me know if you are interested.

The mini stop sign on the chain was calling to me as we passed it. Guy was up for helping me put the kids behind it then we encouraged them to shake it. No additional effort needed. They had a blast & I got some adorable shots of them playing together. The sign cracked me up. It was really funny for Guy & Leanne who Got to stop for every 'hysterical' marker growing up. We all had a great time on the train & with the return of my wide angle lens we got the self portrait group shot! They loved sitting on the seat by themselves. Madison is getting really good at jumping & actually getting some air. She and Guy enjoyed a cuddle in his jacket when she was tired of riding in the stroller under the blanket as we walked around DC.

The first shot in this set shows the bottom part of our luggage carrier. Yep, the same one where the top flew off while Guy was driving. The shot just under it is of Madison pushing the alarm button in the elevator. Once the kids realized they put the alarm button on the bottom {nearest the kids!!!} in every single elevator we got into, they just HAD to push it. Oh, and the call button for emergencies was right next to it in the hotel elevator. Despite our diligence in watching them they managed to hit it at least once in almost every ride. Leanne even got one once with her booty! :-) What do you do with two one year olds in a subway station next to steep drop offs to the tracks? Make them sit! Don't they look so obedient?

In the last few shots above we have our super awesome stroller! {so worth the investiment & we'll never need a 2nd stroller. How many have you or your friends bought?} holding the two kiddos. Blake did an excellent job of taking a nap on the go. Madison? Not so much. She's a bit like me and can't miss any of the action. Especially if there are yummy snacks available!

Madison cracks me up here. The glasses all askew and her pants sagging big time. Blake was busy eyeing the rocks hoping to get more to throw in the river.

We only have two weeks to Christmas and about three to our next attempt to have a kid. Time is definitely moving right on by which is just fine with me right now. I hope you don't mind hearing all the details {cover your eyes Judy - you'll get TMI notices} of our cycle. It's great for my sanity to share and may help someone else in the same situation.

Christmas card 2

2009-12-09T16:54:00.002-05:00

Ooops, I had the card ready, but didn't post it!

We stopped by a cool store front to take a couple of the kids. It was the normal only one kid looking and only one smiling {though I think they are all cute}. I wish I had video of when these card shots were taken. Both of them were giggling.

Front

Inside spread

Back

Christmas card 1

2009-12-07T23:42:00.003-05:00

This week is Christmas Card week. I feel like plugging some of our pictures into Christmas cards & sharing them with you. Since snail mail and I don't get along together these digital versions are from my heart to yours!!
Front

Middle

Back

In the last few days Blake went from occasionally using words to using them all day long! Madison also totally shocked us when she filled in the next number and letter when counting to 10 {haven't even done that much!} & singing or saying the ABC's. Love it! The explosion of skills and knowledge is no joke.

We had a fabulous time with Leanne in DC last week. She had never been there before. Leanne lives in Melbourne Australia and has been visiting the other siblings in Utah for the previous two weeks. Tomorrow she is in for it with the really long flights and she'll skip Wednesday with the time change on her way home! Mum, Dad & her dog Bailey will welcome her home with open arms.

I have a lot to say about our trip to DC. We encountered an example of absolutely FABULOUS customer service from the staff and manager of the Lorien Hotel & Spa in Old Town Alexandria. Upon our original check in we were informed the staff was changing the two cribs over to another room since they would fit better in the bigger room. How sweet & lovely. Our first night there the parking attendant {valet parking only} caused some damage to our roof top hard plastic luggage storage. The damage caused the top section to break off while driving. Luckily the car behind was able to swerve. The manager from the hotel took responsibility with a can do attitude to fixing the issue prior to us checking out. He managed to get a new luggage storage unit for us the next day! He also upgraded our room to a two room suite our last night when he learned the kids didn't sleep well in the same room with us {up 6 times in one night}.

The huge claw foot tub in an even bigger shower room was worth the stay in the suite alone. Leanne, Guy & I all took a turn in the tub {I was even able to comfortably fully submerge my body which is rare}. The view of the downtown street on the second level in our first room was way cool. The kids loved watching the people go by. Every time Blake hurd the bus go by he'd stop in his tracks to let us know another bus went by. He only said it for busses and not for any of the large trucks & street sweeper that went by. Smart kid. The view from the 5th floor two bedroom suite balcony was equally impressive for a different reason.

We had a super relaxing and enjoyable trip with no real agenda & no real sight seeing plan. We used the train, our super sweet stroller and our feet to get around most of the time. Leanne was feeling a bit sick some of the time & we also came down with it. The sick didn't make us miserable and did not affect out fun level at all! It's just a small side note to a fabulous time. I knew it was going to be fun when Guy & Leanne came into the room the first night after midnight {flight came in at 11pm} trying to contain their giggles & after four turn arounds due to more attention paid to giggling instead of listening to the all mighty TomTom.

Here is Leanne's Twilight shot. So not really, but I had to get her Twilight obsession in here somehow! lol

The time approaches quickly

2009-11-28T11:43:00.004-05:00

I find myself looking forward to January while dreading it at the same time. We have decided to try for another child in January. Really, I wanted to try in November, but open enrollment to add maternity coverage to my policy is in November for a January 1st effective date. The good news? My cycle should cooperate fully for us to begin treatment right around the 3rd. Health insurance is in order, Aflac coverage is in effect, and the Reproductive Endocrinologist doctor has been visited with a plan in place. I'll order my fertility meds on January 1st so it leaves the door open for a second cycle without having to meet my yearly prescription deductible again. Though really, I think we'll just do one cycle. Even with drug coverage the cost will be about $400 just for the meds. The doctor visits will all be on top of that.

If you are unfamiliar with our story here is a brief rundown of our history trying to have kids. We got married in November 2002. I'm not a fan of the pill so we used a method of birth control my OB called parents... Nothing happened that first year. We started to see what happened the 2nd year we were married. Nope. Nothing. By the third year we were given Clomid by my OB to help us. This caused my cycle to be a day or two longer, but we had no result. About this time I started to learn more about fertility and we went to a fertility specialist {Reproductive Endocrinologist}. I finally read Take Charge of Your Fertility {mind opener & life changer}, and started learning as much as possible about fertility causes and treatments. In year three we did more Clomid rounds {7 total overall}, had a uterine polyp surgically removed, underwent more testing & did a couple rounds of super ovulation cycles with intrauterine insemination {IUI}. Year four finally brought us success 9 months into it after 3 more super ovulation cycles, a big simple cyst, discovering fibroids in my uterus & giving up.

Our successful cycle was a super ovulation cycle decreasing by 1/3 the folical {egg} stimulating hormones, adding a couple days for them to mature, skipping the IUI by getting together normally, using PreSeed sperm friendly stuff & increasing the progesterone dosage by 1/3. Even with twins we had low HCG {pregnancy hormone} numbers that did not double within the normal 48-72 hours. We are going to try the same wonder combination of drugs this time we try.

One thing no one tells you at any point on a journey to parenthood with any issues... It is always a game of hurry up and wait. Hurry get your appointment, wait three months to actually see the doctor. Hurry up and use or do these fertility drugs/treatments, complications cause a 2 month delay in trying again after it was unsuccessful. Find a possible cause for your fertility issues, go through treatment and/or surgery with no active trying for a while. There is always a hurry to do something followed by a period of waiting until finally there is success with a live birth or adoption.

It's pretty funny. The people we have told we are trying again almost all assume that we will definitely get pregnant again And it will be more then one again. We're not so sure it will work. I love their optimism though. Maybe it's the general fascination with multiples mixed with the desire to personally know a family with more then one set prompting those predictions. It's human nature to want to know something other people don't. Hey, my aunt & uncle won the lottery! See, I play that game too. Who else knows someone that actually won the lottery? lol

Here is a shot of the twins with their smushed blueberry hands that I talked about on my Facebook status.

Blake is such a natural poser! I did not encourage this pose, but I'm so glad he did it.

For all those who think Blake looks like me. Yeeaaah, No. He looks just like Guy here.

Madison looks so old here to me. Like a 4 or 5 year old. Wow, so crazy.

Guy made a JibJab ElfYourself video with the twins. I finally see why people think they look alike. With no hair showing and no real body their faces are quite similar. Check it out. Blake's tongue out is so funny. Madison's zen expression makes all the radical moves funny too.

Our sweet Madison

2009-11-20T22:47:00.004-05:00

Our cute little Madison has decided she doesn't need hands or handrails to go up or Down steps. Well, some steps. She is a smart cookie so she'll only go down wide steps and last steps when there is plenty of room to correct a bit of wobble. We were all totally amazing since going down stairs with no support is usually a 2-3 year old skill. Check it out!

We were definitely grateful for our friends pool net. Madison also decided to test it out by walking right into it. She got wet, but no one else did trying to fish her out! lol The only part of her that got wet was her knees and a little of her shorts.

If you are hanging out with me and are looking for a little baby love Please pick Madison. She seems to have the need to be held about 1/2 of every day now. What's up with that? She is definitely our Little Lumpa Love!

Her bangs are getting long enough I really need to start pulling them back every day. She pulls hair bows out right away, but will leave a rubber band in longer. The other day I switched her earrings out, and she was really pleased when only she received the special earring treatment & pretty compliments on them. Hmmm, maybe I'll start making a big deal about the hair clips. Blogging is often so good for organizing ones thoughts.

Madison loves to sing. She loves dry snacky foods like pretzels, goldfish and corn chex. She'd rather drink milk then eat anytime, and breakfast is not her favorite meal. Madison can repeat almost any word I ask her to say, but she rarely talks to say something. Her feelings are very easily injured, but she does not want to stop doing something just because I tell her no. No matter how badly Blake hurts her in his exuberance she loves him unconditionally and will always be in site of him unless she is in our arms or asleep.

Speaking of asleep. I'm off to bed! Madison will not nap in the car unless it is an hours long ride. She also takes her time going to sleep. We knew she took a while to go to sleep, but with the supervision needed due to the toddler beds we see how long it takes her. I love watching the process she goes through. We now are leaving the door open instead of sitting in the room with them. Maybe by next week well be able to just shut the door after telling them to go to sleep.

Do I remember how to blog?

2009-11-10T11:58:00.002-05:00

Hey my family, friends and followers! It really has been almost a month since I posted anything. So many things have happened the last month. Once again many blog posts were written in my mind with no one to appreciate them, but me. Aaahhhhh, oh well.

October was my busiest work month ever {and I mean ever}. It has taught me that limits need to be set. I've decided to only make up to 3 appointments a week in the future so this amount of drama and stress doesn't happen again. By drama I mean for us as a family, because mommy and wifey were way too busy working much of the time.

These kangaroo outfits I had made for the kids are the cats meow! Love them. In case I neglected to mention it months ago our babies are officially dual citizens with citizenship in both the United States and Australia. We think it will give them options when they are making life decisions.

Our cute little Aussie's! Yes, Madison really does have a red face. It gets red whenever she is active or someone so much as hints at touching her. Unfortunately she just has sensitive skin. I only edit it out in the pictures I print and not even all of those. It's a part of who she is.

We converted the cribs into toddler beds this week. The first night was amazing! We could not believe they just went to sleep without getting out of their beds. Naps and night night the next three days required us to sit in there with them as a visual reminder to stay still. Within 2-10 minutes they were out every time. Madison has been inspired to learn how to open their door with this change. The first time after a nap I just thought it was a fluke. But the next morning and then this morning proved this is just not the case. The little stinker is so smart.

The kids love to bring us shoes! Their shoes or ours. It doesn't matter. They are really persistent about us taking those shoes when they are offering too.

"Really, dad, you Want the shoes!" ~ Blake

Tonight was a whole new level of drama when it came to the toddler beds.

It started out with me deciding we needed to move on to the next step of leaving the room immediately after getting them into bed. Madison was so quite I didn't even hear her get out of bed.
After only a few minutes I went in to look at one full and one empty bed. I found her sitting on the air vent behind the chair playing with the just unplugged night light. I told her she needed to get into bed for night night, only to meet with a major crying jag. m a j o r .
She calmed down after a minute so I left. I hear a little something in there, and go in to find Madison sitting on Blake's back. Another meltdown being put into her own bed.
This time I was a lot harsher with her saying she had better stay in bed and shut the door as I left {it now has a cover over the handle}. She cried and cried then quieted. Then she cried, cried right by the door and then quieted. The third time she cried, cried by the door and quieted I went back in.
We were cuddling in the recliner when I hear some not so happy whiny sounds from Blake as he's moving around. I thought maybe one of them dropped a bomb. Nope. I cuddled them both sitting on the floor for a minute. When Blake moved around and got off my lap I asked if he would like to go back to bed. He said, 'Yes' while moving to get in, but started crying as he did it. Pulling him back out just made him cry harder as he obviously wanted to go to sleep.
I felt along his legs to find yet another charlie horse! Man this kid gets knotted muscles way too much.
Madison was just trying to let me know her brother needed help. Oh, I can't wait until they can just tell me what they need and want. After spending an additional 30 minutes to work out the knot & give them a snack & cuddle we totaled two full hours of them 'going' to sleep tonight.

Fun & Rain

2009-10-14T21:38:00.002-04:00

It's a perfect day to post about this day back in August. I had to reschedule today's photo shoot because it was 100% chance of rain. When is it ever 100% chance? lol Luckily their schedule will also be good for tomorrow. Cool rainy days are my favorite. I love the chill & gloominess with the sound of soft rain. There is just nothing more calm and homey to me. Grabbing a blanket & a book was the old way to enjoy such days. Now I have the super cuddly Madison who also thoroughly enjoys the fantastic feel of a blanket!

The Con Agra plant that had an explosion this summer is right by us in the town Guy works for. They had a huge picnic for the employees & their families as well as the town employees. We saw some friends there who made great companions to enjoy the meal. We met David when we hosted him in our home for a month while his family was in the process of moving here, and we fell in love with their sweet family. Nicole keeps everyone entertained almost anywhere she goes. She also sweetly brought over some clothes this week to donate to Blake's wardrobe.

While we were out on the playground after eating the rain started spitting at us. To me the clouds didn't look so bad. Luckily, Blake and I were close to the pavilion when the clouds unloaded. Not so much for Guy & Madison! It was a mad scramble for them to make it to dryness. Once again I was wrong when Guy suggested we leave & I thought it would all let up soon. We barely made it into the car when the heavy rain started again! It's a good think I listen to Guy's suggestions most of the time. He's like my mom, usually right...

Busy October - One more way the kids are like puppies

2009-10-09T23:02:00.003-04:00

This is definitely the busiest I have ever been in my life. I cannot think of any other time I have had so much to do. Ever. Guy has been a super star too! We only have about three more very busy weeks to get through. Right on. Sometimes my brain has felt fractured lately. Surprisingly it is all manageable.

The kids are learning more every day. They each learned at least 3-4 words today. Madison also learned to play patty cake, and she could climb in and out of some things at Marbles museum she couldn't do the last time we were there. Blake is a spaz. Yep, a total ball of energy with a great big smacky kiss, big hugs & wild antics. They love to be given a task. Take an item to the garbage, put something away or anything else we can dream up will get them to stop anything they were doing just to do what we ask. They even notice what needs to be done. If there is a piece of paper, dirty dish or dirty diaper they will ask to put it where it belongs. Too bad it wont last very long as any more experienced mom is probably thinking right now.

When will I ever stop thinking of Blake as the small twin? I pulled out a pair of pants just as big and long as Madison's knowing they would be too long and big. They fit perfect! lol He definitely still eats more then her.

The next pictures waiting in line to be blogged about just happened to be these little gems. I think they follow the last post about about the kiddos being like puppies rather well.

Why my kids are like puppies...

2009-10-05T19:09:00.002-04:00

They chew on things they aren't supposed to.

They greet us like we have been apart forever.

They are completely dependent.

We have to clean up their poo.

They pant when they get really excited.

They scramble to get to where they are going no matter how often they loose their footing, fall, veer sideways or run into something.

They love to cuddle.

They love to be petted.

They love to lick stuff & me.

They like to go for walks.

They howl when they are upset.

They howl when they are happy.

They want what you have.

They want what each other has.

They pin each other down.

They hop on each others backs.

They play together.

They snarl & yap at each other.

They follow each other around.

They follow us around.

They work together to get things done.

They beg for food.

They beg to be picked up.

They love no matter what.

They hate to get in trouble.

They get in trouble often.

They love to nap.

They learn quickly.

They will stop everything to kiss on each other.

They love to stretch.

Did I mention they love! love! love! love! love! each other and us?

They love to get into the bath.

They pee whenever the mood strikes.

They jump and run away whenever you catch them doing something bad.

They scratch themselves.

They sneak around to do stuff they know is bad.

They are curious about everything.

They drool.

They grow too quickly.

Actually our dog was better behaved.
(He Lives in Georgia now)

Hope this post gave you a good giggle! It took me all day to rustle up these photos.

More vids! - Dancing & laughing

2009-10-04T20:18:00.003-04:00

Guy took some videos when I was out shooting all day Saturday. Then we looked at a few before those only to find some funny stuff! Yes, the first is long at 1 1/2 minutes, but the rest are all pretty short . After so many great comments on the last videos you now get some more. Hope you enjoy them.

This first video is us trying to get them both dancing. I think what ends up happening is way better. Blake is definitely a mover and shaker! Madison loves to do whatever Blake does, and she isn't quite as coordinated as he is.

This next one is 30ish seconds. Madison cracks me up. Even though she is getting abused by Blake she just wants to dance. This is completely typical of how they are each and every day.

Number three is 22 seconds long since we kept having to break for drama & discipline. It is probably my favorite of Maddy though. How she does things is so funny. She loves the big Ooooo face right now too.

#4 is 16 seconds. Do you think Blake's dream in life is to be a pro wrestler? I'm leaning towards a big YES.

How many giggles can fit into 11 seconds? Guy said the kids ran around doing this for at least 10 minutes before he pulled out the camera. Round and round the coffee table they go.

The last second of these 17 is my favorite. Blake definitely knows he didn't do what he was supposed to...

Our neices first professional shots!

2009-10-03T21:19:00.002-04:00

Guy's sister, Ngaire, and her husband, Brian, had a baby girl back on September 16th. Her due date is actually next Saturday! Despite being four weeks early she weighed in at 6pds 8 oz! She also was able to room with them & come home right away. She is gaining weight well too. Ngaire & Brian tried to get pregnant for 14 years when this little miracle happened. We are so happy for them and hope that parenthood is all they hoped and dreamed it would be.

We all live in a small place

2009-10-01T00:43:00.003-04:00

Tonight I've realized I'm in my own little world.

It's amazing how interconnected we are. It's also amazing at how out of touch we are {can be}.

Back in the day as a newly married couple we visited several places in Guy's native country of Australia. When we stopped in Sydney we stayed with a marvelous couple who are called Aunt & Uncle though there is no actual relationship. I remember not thinking anything of settling into the room we stayed in only to find out as we laid down for the night it was the master bedroom. Even today this still is an amazing gift I find hard to believe a couple with grown children would bestow on a young married couple. I also still remember vividly how disappointed everyone was when we arrived to sight see at the most amazing mountain lookout {Australia's version of the Grand Canyon} completely shrouded in fog. I almost couldn't contain my excitement and wonder at the misty wonders appearing before my camera lens. Who cared about the vast view hidden from me when there were so many cool shapes & images all around me. For a girl from Phoenix Arizona, the fog is a super rare and wondrous site. I'm still not sure everyone believed my excitement. It really was sooooo cool.

With all the news being so repetitive, months ago I just stopped watching and reading it. Tonight Guy mentioned some people thought Survivor shouldn't air this week. What? Why? He looked at me with an incredulous look then told me a bad tsunami hit Somoa killing many people. Not good. I thought of all the Tongan and Samoan people we both knew over the years. None of them lived there, but being a descendant from such a small chain of islands they have to be related and know many of the victims.

Guy's mum called late this evening to check in for the first time since arriving in Australia almost two weeks ago. She mentioned Chris & Kessa, who so graciously gave us their master bedroom, were trying to contact the relatives they still kept in contact with in Samoa. So far they don't know much, but there will be a massive group burial for the dead and missing. How sad.

Isn't it strange how we are so interconnected. Maybe many people only know or care about the small area they were born to and still live by. I think most of us, though, have a much bigger and often a global imprint in our connections.

Johnny Lingo was a very popular video in my generation & further back. It is a teaching video by my church (I think - At least that's where many of us saw it) which teaches the value of self worth. If you have ever heard someone say something about a '10 cow wife' it comes from this movie. Here is part one of three showing the movie. You can just click to watch it on YouTube, then after it finishes you will see Part two then Part three. It's a classic! Keep in mind it was created in 1969 so it is a bit poor on the quality & totally campy. Love it. It should make you laugh.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-PLyy0XM3Y&feature=player_embedded

Johnny Lingo land, I sure hope you recover quickly!!!

Beachy love - Uhm still showing ya'll August... lol

2009-09-30T22:31:00.002-04:00

These were all taken in Virginia Beach back in August. I love destination weddings. LOVE them! How much fun is it to head off to an exciting place different from home for your wedding? We went to San Diego from Phoenix for ours. Totally loved the nice intimate experience with just our parents as companions & witnesses.

Here's the shot of why she needed the love. Totally not diggin the seat above the water in the bottom.

I'll say it again. Come anywhere with us and be prepared to have your hand gripped by Madison most of the time! That is unless you want to hold her. She'll let you do that as the other option. She is our little lumpa love. For sure.

Videos of the kids playing in the drizzly rain

2009-09-26T01:36:00.003-04:00

I'm not sure if these are in order, but it's after 1 am & the kids are finally both asleep! Both videos are of the kids playing in the drizzly rain for the first time. They loved it. They are both 90 seconds long. I'm pretty sure only family will love watching these and anyone else would be bored silly! You've been warned. :-)

So the cutest thing tonight. Both babies (toddlers) are a touch sick. Blake had a fever this evening & woke up crying. The waking up crying is pretty normal at least 2 days a week. This woke Madison up too who was sooo not happy to be up, but will not be left in her crib should he be taken out of his to sooth him... Well, as long as they were up I decided to change their diapers to which they cried loudly. Guy got up to cuddle them as I went to get the fever reducer. As soon as Blake transferred over to my arms so did Madison and Guy hightailed it to bed (I'm sure he turned on the fan to drown out any future noise - Smart man!). In my arms both kids had to have an arm around the other baby! Love it. I started singing to them & wound down after a few minutes. Blake started to sing to tell me he wanted me to keep going. At least someone likes my singing.

After a couple more minutes he popped up all serious and had to get down. He starts to pat his diaper and looks very concerned. I ask if he wants to go potty to which he repeated it over and over as he sprinted to the bathroom. We followed. He sat down as I tried to maneuver Maddy and I down to the floor. He shivered a little and I asked if he needed his diaper off. He definitely wanted it off & peed right as I was getting it off. Poor fellow having such a slow mom. Well, the shivers started in earnest and he turns towards the tub and mutters something. I think he was combining diaper and bath. Still not sure. I asked if he wanted to take a bath. He DEFINITELY wanted a bath and immediately got more excited.... And finished peeing on the side of tub.

Clothes off. Put him in while filling the tub. Cleaned up the pee. He had a ball in the tub which alleviated his shivers and brought down his fever! Wooo Hoooo. It was still there, but definitely not so high. Listening to you kids telling you what they want really pays off sometimes. Both kids enjoyed their cuddle together, Blake is closer still to potty training, and he knew what to do to feel better. Love it!

Do you think playing in the warm drizzle brought on the sick? I don't, but maybe you disagree.

Sorry again - new posts coming soon

2009-09-16T23:45:00.001-04:00

Love ya! Thanks for checkin in!

Kiddo small update

2009-09-12T22:46:00.002-04:00

I LOVE how Madison and Blake share. Just now Blake was busy playing with a toy. I had some pretzels on offer for him which he definitely wanted. Madison was between us closer to me & noticed our exchange. She grabbed the three pretzels from me and took them to Blake without needing to be asked. Then she came back for her own. Love it!

The kids are eaters! EATERS! They will be eating us out of house and home soon enough. Maybe they don't eat more then other kids, but it sure feels like they do.

A word on shoes & clothes.

I don't know if you remember, but I had size 18mo, 24mo and 2T for the kids to get them through to long sleeves. I had also purchased and gotten some 24mo to 3T stuff for winter. Madison outgrew her 18 month old stuff by June. She is now pretty much out of all 24mo and 2T clothes in shirts, shorts and dresses. Pants still fit her well in the 2T size. Luckily there were some 3T stuff for Maddy next summer she is wearing now like the tee shirts & dresses. She is solid like a tree trunk. Blake always seems like the small one to us. However, we just realized he is now in size 7 shoes and can't fit into the smaller clothes. Blake is now wearing all of his 2T clothes. They definitely have enough stuff that fits to get us to the winter clothes. I'm just shocked, because EVERYONE told us the kids would stay in 18 month and 24mo/2T for a long time (like 6 months or more). Nope, our kids are still topping out at around 4 months per size. Though I really hope they aren't wearing 4T this time next year at age 2 and 3 months!

Oh, I forgot my lament about shoes. Size 7 is usually a size kids over 2 wear. This is when their feet naturally lose the baby/toddler fat lump on the top of their feet. Our kids still very much have the little fat lump making it hard to find shoes that fit. This is especially true when mama won't pay more then $5, preferring to receive them between free and $2 per pair.

These cute little faces are definitely worth any hassle or expense they bring us!

The really funny thing to me is the pictures that were next in line to share perfectly matched the words I had already written. Cool!

30 days of summer - Last day!

2009-09-09T15:16:00.002-04:00

A few weeks ago I rented a camera to test out. When returning the camera I saw a great bag that was calling my name. It is a small camera bag that makes taking just the minimum equipment or for quick lens changes during shoots. Last week I had the bag on the kitchen counter. Are you with me on where this is going?

Yeah, Blake somehow (musta grown a bit) managed to reach the bag from the middle of the counter. I had not zipped it so he was able to get my all around lens out. He threw it down twice on the floor before I made it to him. It looked fine and seemed fine on my camera. It wasn't! All the photos taken with it are blurry on both ends. So not cool.

If you are wondering why photography is an expensive purchase. Our new lens set us back $1356.40 and will be here tomorrow. Ouch! We weren't planning on any new lens purchases for a year. Kids. Gotta love em.

Somehow this series of photos fits this story of the broken lens very well! What's the most expensive thing your kids have completely ruined?

Madison is getting wise. Whenever she gets told no or gets caught doing something wrong she comes up to one of us for a kiss. Kisses make the whole world better in her book. She is the funniest walker. I love watching her lurching ungainly steps with both arms often held back. I'm sure she'll start to get better in the next month or so. Until then it makes me giggle.

30 days of summer - Day 29 - Contest time!

2009-09-03T07:38:00.003-04:00

If you are feeling crabby I have the pick me up for you. A chance to win!

Would you like to earn a free sitting or a fine art gift certificate? You can by entering our contest at the Multiples and More Blog Party. I'll be featured sometime today as one of the big contests. They will be posting new contests every 1-2 hours all day. Already I entered to win some nice handmade silver jewelry. All of the official contests will be open until Sunday after dinner. There is also an area where many more will be linking to their own contest. Check it all out here!

Don't forget about Fine Art Friday starting on the S & G Photography blog tomorrow. It will be your chance to own a great fine art print at a discounted price. Each Friday I will feature a different fine art print for a week.

30 days of summer - Day 28 - Have you ever had to bowl your water?

2009-09-02T20:09:00.003-04:00

Once again Madison proved she is just too tall for her own good.

She was a little fussy while I was doing the dishes this evening. Behavior very normal around here while trying to do dishes so I ignored it. All of a sudden I hear a small splat! Yuk. She just puked on the floor behind me. After cleaning it up I tried to figure out what made her sick by mentally reviewing her recent intake. Nothing came to mind and she toddled off to play with Blake obviously feeling a lot better. As I turned back to the dishes I notice there was a milk cup missing from last nights milk. Ah ha! Sure enough I tracked it down out on the screened porch with the kids, still 1/2 full of gross milk. I am still wondering how she got it off the counter. It was not close to the edge at all.

They look sad in these pictures, but they really love being out there and someone on the other side of the glass to play with.

Guy reminded me to blog about something that happened to me a few weeks ago. We received a recorded call letting us know there would be some routine maintenance done to our water main in a couple of days between the hours of 8am to 5pm. She mentioned we would have to bowl water for at least 24 hours. She didn't have much of an accent so I wondered if I heard her correctly. My thoughts started imagining bowls of water around our house for flushing, tooth brushing, drinking, food prep, dish washing and whatever else. It was going to be a lot of bowls and how do I keep the kids out of them. My thoughts turned to planning to be away from home as much of the day as possible. Then it occurred to me I couldn't possibly have heard her right even though she repeated it a few times and I chose the option of listening to the message again.

Rewind a couple of years. I used to work with a very NC southern girl named Angela. What a nice person! One day I heard her say oil when talking to someone. It pretty much sounded like bowl with no B. Oh, it finally dawned on me what she was telling me. Instead of telling me to 'bowl' my water she was saying I really needed to 'boil' my water! Can I just roll on the floor laughing? Guy also got a good kick out of it. Really, I should have made a video of this story so you could hear what I heard! Hope you got a kick out of it too. Not many people have a strong accent here in North Carolina, but a few words have a definite twist to them.

For a few more giggles check out this updated version of the many faces of Blake storyboard.

Madison isn't quite as crazy as Blake. While Blake may be the class clown, Madison will be working it. She is a watcher then a doer.

30 days of summer - Day 27 - Creativity rocks!

2009-09-01T21:27:00.001-04:00

Here are some of the things I've worked on recently. The kids look so cute in their matching shirts. Madison is usually called a boy, but it doesn't bother me at all! It's so fun to make new things and see the kids wear them. I still need to sew the last dress together then I have some cool winter jammies to make.

Starting on Friday I'm going to be doing Fine Art Friday where I have a fine art photo each week on special. Please make sure to check it out each week. Let me know if there is a style of photo you would like to see for sale. If I don't have it, I can check my archives and look out for the opportunity to fulfill your art dreams! Let me know if there is a particular print you would like to see me offer in an upcoming Fine Art Friday. Check out some of my stuff here.

30 days of summer - Day 26 - NO!

2009-08-29T09:40:00.002-04:00

I think I've finally fixed the comments! I thought people just weren't wanting to leave comments for me anymore.... It turns out this cool blog template I'm using doesn't support comments embedded on the main page so I switched it back to a full page view when you select comments below any post. Comments are always appreciated!!!

These photos were all shot on our front porch a few weeks ago right after breakfast (yes, I'm still weeks behind in our personal photo editing!). Sometimes I let them play just on the porch and sometimes they get to get off as well. Our porch is definitely big enough to give them plenty of room to move around. One of Blake's favorite things to do is take the cushions off our furniture. Without the cushions they can get on and off much easier. Fast forward to now and we have almost kicked the cushion removing habit.

So what was all the drama about? I said they could not get off the porch. They tried and tried and tried. Each time I would say no when Blake would promptly burst into a noisy wailing tearful mess.

30 days of summer - Day 25 - Help - What are these bites from?

2009-08-28T20:53:00.002-04:00

Does anyone know what kind of thing gave Madison and I these awful bites? I know we got them while sitting on the bottom step of our front porch since her and I sat there yesterday evening for a while. I noticed both of us had red welts like any mosquito bite and about as itchy. The one on my calf really started bothering me while trying to go to sleep. Today both of us now have these larger red welts with dime sized orangy white dimpled skin in the middle. It is still irritated when fabric or something else touches it and kinda throbs, but the throbbing is barely noticeable. We showed it to the pharmacist who said to go to the doctor if it continues to get worse. There weren't any helpful bite photos online. Any ideas?

These next shots are all from our trip to Georgia in July. We went to the pool where we all had a great time once the babies got used to the water. Blake enjoyed all of the adventurous things while Madison liked lounging and cuddling the most. Though surprisingly she sat on the side and threw the tennis ball a few times. I think the shot of Blake and Gracie through the splash from Blake's tennis ball throw is way cool! My dad and Guy even took over the camera for a while so I could have some fun, get shots and even be in a few.

The kids eating their banana and raisin snack were so funny. Blake had almost an entire banana shoved into his mouth in the first few shots. He also tried to get in great big handfuls of raisins so Madison had to do the same to make sure she was getting her fair share. Check out how slim she is looking. Though really she's as solid as a tree trunk. Even though Blake is big he still feels like a feather weight to me.

Infertility & Adoption - What to say to a friend dealing with these issues

2009-08-25T00:10:00.002-04:00

What to you say to a friend dealing with infertility?

Well, this is a huge topic most of us who have dealt with could write novels about. The easiest thing to say is, "I'm sorry." Then zip it. Really. That's it. Nothing more is needed nor in most cases wanted. This advice is for those fertile mertyls out there.

My friend send me a link to this blog with a post talking about this subject and a call out for links to blog posts talking about this topic. I love to talk about infertility, because too many of us keep it all bottled inside.

We really DO NOT want to hear about the one friend you know someone who knows someone who is related to said someone got pregnant on their own after years of trying, adopting a child or having a baby by artificial reproductive technologies (ART). Those are the far and few between. They are the ones people talk about. People don't talk about the 95% left who still don't have a baby, gave up years ago for emotional and/or financial reasons, adopted the one baby, had the one baby by ART or are still plugging away at getting the one live baby. Stories of hope are great, but they aren't that helpful.

Don't get me wrong. Most of us are very appreciative of your concern for us. It's just that the journey of infertility is truly like an old wooden roller coaster with super highs and lows jostling you then entire trip. I broke my tailbone on one of those stinkin roller coasters about 6 years ago and it still hurts making this the perfect metaphor for me! With all the ups and downs it is really hard to gauge what comments will be hurtful and which will be OK at any given time. The same comment can be taken either way depending on the receivers spot on the ride.

My spot is a great one right now. I have two beautiful babies whom I used to call my little drug babies until Guy, the cop, kept complaining because it sounds bad. Those drugs were and are awesome for helping them get here to us.

My spot may not be so great soon. We are gearing up to try again in December. I really thought it would be all fine and dandy with no drama. Well, dang it, I'm already having drama about my doctors appointment next week to see what we need to do before then. Most Reproductive Endocrinologists want to do ALL the tests over again if you have been more then a year since your last tests. Not fun and they can be pricy. The last few nights I've been dreaming about being pregnant and dramatic situations around pregnancy.

Over the last few weeks I've mentioned to several people we are about to try again. Yeah, no one cares. I'm pretty sure this is the typcial reaction from people when someone already has kids. But we aren't typical. We can't expect to be announcing happy news in 3-6 months. We also have to deal with the drama of doctors appointments, laying out the dough, prepping for a cycle and all the drugs.

The other blog also brought up adoption. I'm glad she did. Most of us with fertility issues have thought long and hard about adoption. Both my husband and I would love to adopt especially because we both have adopted siblings we adore! But that is often harder or just as hard as fertility treatments. Domestic private (both open and closed) adoption is a lot of work by the adoptive parents, quite expensive (like IVF expensive) and there is no guarentee because the birth mom/family has to find you and pick you. Domestic adoption through foster care is very time consuming, economical, often heart breaking as you say goodby to one or more kids you've taken in that were available for adoption and very rarely can you get an infant especially one not adidcted or handicapped. International adoption is more of a guarentee with it's long long waits, high expenses (20-35 thousand) & stacks of paperwork though most contries are much less available and more restrictive about allowing United States adoptions. Oh, and the most obnoxious thing about modern adoption. You have to prove over and over again to many people YOU are worthy to get a child. Talk about fear of rejection and hurt when so many can just get pregnant who are clearly unworthy, but they get to keep their baby. Unfortunately there are many less babies available for adoption then there are people who want to adopt. Abortion is definitely a contributing factor.

Speaking of abortion. I called Planned Parenthood (I didn't know what they were really all about then) for some advice and leads on adopting figuring they were counceling women of their options to place a child for adoption, abort & offering birth control. The lady rudely let me know they do not help with adoptions in any way. Wow!

Not only is primary infertility a major issue in this country so is secondary infertility. So many couples have one or more children and then hit a fertility roadblock. We should not be limited to being completely greatful for the one or more child we have. Only we and our Heavenly Father can determine when our family is complete. It is OK to want more children. Not only is it OK, we should be able and supported for trying to complete our family with necessary fertility treatments and/or adoptions. I feel just as bad for those suffering from secondary infertility. They must feel like all of a sudden a wall is in front of them blocking the goal they saw only yesterday.

What to you say to a friend dealing with infertility? - I'm sorry. As many times as she needs to hear it over the span of your relationship. If you have some fabulous knowledge of fertility help feel free to share it. There may be just the tid bit of information they need to get pregnant. If you hear of any bith mom wanting to place her child for adoption make sure to blog about it and send an email to all of your friends. Someone may just know the adoptive parents for the child. Definitely give me a shout out as I know a few people actively looking to adopt right now.

There is definitely hope, love, support, luck, connections & knowledge out there. Love is the way to share and help. Love is always an appreciated emotion. Love doesn't mean pity or even empathy. Love is just love. To all my friends and family. I LOVE YOU!!!

30 days of summer - Day 24 - haircuts smaercuts

2009-08-24T23:34:00.002-04:00

This picture share is all about drama. We took them in to the KIDS hair salon while in GA a few weeks ago. Guy was tired of my procrastinating cutting Blake's hair & I wasn't quite sure what I would do with Madison's.

These kids will be getting mommy haircuts until I'm up to this drama again. And it was expensive! $30 to whack at their hair for about 8 minutes.

My sweet babies! They are so interesting to watch grow & develop. I know it will all pass quickly in the grand scheme of things so I try and keep that in mind. Who knows if they will want a cuddle or kiss tomorrow so I'd better take them now. Who knows if they will eat a particular food tomorrow so I try not to get upset if they don't eat something. Who knows if they will be doing that cute thing tomorrow so I'd better watch today. There are so many fleeting expressions, actions and moments. Even the tough days are going to be gone soon. Sure there will be more good and bad to come, but it will be different.

Though I can very clearly rejoice the first year is over!!!! Today we went for a walk. They hopped up running to the door calling out 'Bu Bye' repeatedly as soon I let them know we were leaving. They both walked out the door on their own leaving me to grab everything we needed in my hands so there were no return trips to get something. They kept on their glasses and hats almost the whole time & they are starting to tell me what they want, need and see. Life is pretty stinkin good.

I have some cool photos up on the photo blog as well as some shots of some great products. I can design big albums & the new accordion albums from past sessions as well as your upcoming sessions.

30 days of summer - Day 22 - Stone Mountain Park

2009-08-23T23:28:00.002-04:00

When we went to Atlanta a few weeks ago all of us trekked out to Stone Mountain Park. It was definitely a Hotlanta evening keeping us all nice and swampy feeling.

Our first stop in the park was the old plantation home. It was pretty stinky (as in smelly) of old stuff, but I always love seeing it. They had a really pretty little garden right by the house too. Blake & Madison are getting really good about keeping their sunglasses on. Blake went to all of us at one point or another. Gracie and Madison were pretty much inseparable.

We ended up eating dinner at the park. I thought it was funny when the waitress threw our rolls at us from a platform above us. I don't think it was a common practice in the restaurant so she must have just thought we were cool. Oh yeah, we are pretty stinkin cool.

The passifiers are officially gone! Today at church I had a moment of panic when my friends kiddos tossed his/her binkie (a few occasions) on the ground. Both kids were concerned about giving them back to the kids and not using them!!! Love it. I still can't believe how easy it was to get rid of them. There is actually a lot LESS drama in our house without them. No more 'where is it' or 'don't you dare take it from me' to deal with.

I forgot to adjust the aperature when taking this photo of Gracie and I to make us both in focus. It's great she is the one in focus! The photo of Guy and Blake is odd looking to me. Blake's shirt looks kind of like it could belong to Guy with Blake behind him instead of on his shoulder. Maybe it's just me.

30 days of summer - Day 22

2009-08-19T22:13:00.002-04:00

I just haven't had that blogging feeling lately. Mostly it's just been me busy editing the wedding and designing the album. A little of it may be the bad news we received about my grandma. Another part of it is the lack of personal photo editing lately. This morning I looked at my unprocessed photos to find they haven't been processed since the 27th of July. The better part of my day has been spent processing all of our personal photos. Tomorrow or the next day I'll put together a bunch of storyboards to share with you over the next week.

We also started another big project today. While editing the wedding the last week I let the kids use their binkies more then just for sleeping. Bad choice. Blake quickly turned into a binkie wanting little devil. It irritated me so much I decided to take them away from them both cold turkey starting today since Guy would be off for four days. This morning when getting them out of bed Blake wouldn't even look at me in want of finding his lost binkie. He didn't get it and hasn't had it since. He has definitely been short tempered today to say the least. It took him about an hour and a half to get to sleep at nap time with a lot of crying. Madison was annoyed with Blake not letting her sleep, but hasn't really been upset about the loss of her binkie. Tonight Blake was not happy about going to sleep without his binkie & fussed quite a bit. After about 5 minutes of hollering he calmed down a bit until madison lost her balance and hit her head. I went in to cuddle two kids who did not want to be cuddled. They played for a few minutes then I left. Thirty minutes later they were alseep with only normal playing noises. Hopefully the nap was the only real drama we have to go through. Probably not, but they better be over them in the next three days!

My friend had a good idea if the cold turkey doesn't work. She said she puts a hole in their passy so it is not so fun. Then the kiddo makes the hole larger as they try to use it making it unusable. Her kids and many of her friends kids have done very well with this method.

This photo cracks me up. Cute little teary eyed Madison with a mischievous Blake in the background. I really ought to remember to put bibs on my kids more often when they eat. Her shirt is a wreck! And it was the first time she wore said brand new shirt.

Strange... pure strange

2009-08-16T22:22:00.003-04:00

Here is an oldie but goodie shot of Madison checking out Moose last year. Just look at that bald head.

So today I had a very weird prompting to get me to church. It has been hard lately with the twins food, activity level and tiredness. Last night I was waiting for an upload to finish before going to bed. It took until about 12:30 am which only gave me about 7 hours of sleep when all was said and done. My alarm went off at 7:30 am. I quickly turned it off and laid back down for some lazy prayer time. I am suddenly jolted awake by my fire alarm! It went off throughout the house. As soon as my brain realized what it was & I was very alertly upright it stopped. It was 8:10 am. In order to get to church on time it is best to leave at 8:30 or earlier. My thought is the fire alarm was to get me out of bed & to church. The kids were playing happily in their cribs as they normally do (very contentedly for about 30-60 minutes every morning before hollering for me to get them). As I quickly went about getting us all out the door for church I was also busy sniffing every part of the house. No smoke. Nothing.

I did take my camera bag, computer, backup drive and card reader to church with me just on the off chance the house burnt down while we were at church... What was the weirdest prompting you have received in your life?