Category Archives: pictures/video

A Snowman With Personality

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During our last snowfall, the kids and I built a snowman together. I rolled the bottom ball, Anna rolled the middle one, and Peter rolled the head. Phillip busied himself dusting snow off the van (not sure why, but he was more interested in that than the snowman).

Luke agreed to help stack the three balls, so as soon as we got the balls as big as they needed to be, I came in to let Luke know we were ready. He took a glance outside and said, “That’s not big enough. Make it as big as you can manage, so I did.

Now that snowman may not look very big to you in the pictures, but I tell you, rolling that ball was no easy feat! It got so big that I was literally laying across it, pushing with my feet and hoping it didn’t roll the wrong way and dump me on the ground! Then I noticed that I had to move it about 5 feet over to where we were planning to have the snowman stand. Of course, in  a foot of snow, it grew quite a bit in that distance. Talk about some exercise as I used my whole body to roll the huge snowball across our driveway, wondering with each push if it was going to budge. It was fun, though!

I helped Anna make the middle ball bigger because the size ratio for her was about the same as for me with the bigger one. We had very little trouble working together. And I had no trouble at all making Peter’s head bigger. Unfortunately I dropped it and broke it twice before I was done. So, I guess you could say Peter’s head was a remake. 😀

After Luke helped put Mr. Snowman together, he was taller than me and almost as tall as Luke. And best of all, he seemed to have a bit of personality. He had a bright smile* and rosey cheeks that just brought life to him! He also seemed to be leaning comfortably to the side as if to say, “Aren’t I cool?” And he really was….until he melted.

But never fear, the snow is falling again as I type, and you never know. Mr. Snowman might just return with all his coolness and give us another bright, crooked, frozen smile!

*If you are wondering, Mr. Snowman had jelly bean eyes, a carrot nose, a gummy worm mouth, skittle buttons, and broken sponge mop arms. And he didn’t complain a bit about having broken arms!

Candice’s 1st Ponytail

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We celebrated Candice’s first birthday yesterday. Unfortunately I am not ready to post pictures of the actual celebration because I want to do a little video editing (hopefully with my hubby’s help).

Instead I will post pictures of Candice wearing her first ponytail and also ones of her wearing a barrette. I personally think the barrette looks better than the ponytail. Which do you like better?

Ten Inches Shorter

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Anna has alway liked her long hair. As a matter of fact, when I have trimmed it in the past, she has begged me not to cut too much off. A little over a year ago, we learned about Locks of Love when two of her friends decided to donate their hair.

Ever since, Anna has been taking special care of her hair in order to donate to a little girl who needs it. Evidently helping another little girl was enough to convince my sweet 8 year old to cut her hair and actually be excited about it! We have no idea which little girl will get it, and have no way of finding out, but we know that some little girl somewhere will be wearing Anna’s beautiful blonde hair eventually.

If you are interested in donating to Locks of Love, read the guidelines or watch a video. If you would like to help but do not have 10 inches of hair to donate, there is also an option to give a monetary donation or sponsor an event.

Here are some pictures of Anna before and after the cut:

Winter Wonderland

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Over Christmas I saw a foot of snow for the first time in my life. I know, I know. You are thinking, “Only a foot?!” Well, now it becomes quite obvious that I am a southern girl living in a northern state.

Anyway, because I had never seen that much snow at once, I took plenty of pictures. Humor me here, and try not to laugh too hard at my awe over a foot of snow. Just enjoy the pictures, okay? 🙂

Unexpected Christmas Tree

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Several weeks ago, a friend of ours let us borrow a Christmas tree that they would not be using. Since we have a family tradition of spending Friday evenings together as a family, we decided to spend the next Friday decorating for Christmas.

We were very pleased that our friend also loaned us Christmas lights, and the best part was that the lights were blue (both Luke’s and my favorite color)!!

Other than the lights, we went the old fashioned way with decorations. We strung popcorn and hung anything pretty, including jewelry on it! And we did it all to the sound of Christmas music on pandora.

We also made a paper chain counting down the days until Christmas. We cut out slips of paper and divided them between the four older kids. They each colored the same amount of links, and we put them on the chain so that the kids got to take turns taking off the links they created themselves! I think they had a blast!! I know I did!

After making the chain and decorating the tree, we sat on the couch with popcorn and watched The Grinch while staring at our newly decorated borrowed Christmas tree.

What type of decorations do you have up at your house this year? Are there certain traditions that you follow each year?

Candice is Walking!!

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I was afraid Candice’s fractured leg would make her a late walker, but she is too determined for that, I guess. She was already crawling and cruising with her cast on, so I really shouldn’t be surprised that she walked just 3 or 4 weeks after getting the cast removed! She actually started walking well and with purpose the day after she turned 11 months. I am a little behind with the video.

You can see in this video that Candice likes to tease a bit. When I waggled my fingers to encourage her to come to me, she waggled hers right back at me. She was also a bit distracted by Bethany’s encouragement. Oh, and the blur that goes in front of the camera twice during the video? That’s Peter. Fortunately, he is fast enough not to mess up the video beyond posting here on my blog! 🙂

My Favorite Homemade Gift

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At the end of a summer mission trip to Colorado I went on in 1998, all the church members from the church we were helping out gave my partner and me small gag gifts. One of my gifts was an eye pillow because it had inspired quite a bit of laughter between one of the ladies in the church and me. Unfortunately, I can’t remember what we were laughing at! I’ll have to dig through my own journals to find out! But that isn’t the main idea of this post. (Some how I get the feeling that some of you are going to make me explain that one later). 😉

Several years ago, my beloved eye pillow that had gotten me through many headaches was irreparably torn. I was sad but did not let my sadness keep me from being inspired by the fact that I now knew what the eye pillow was filled with and how to make a replacement.

Turns out that the replacement was so easy to make that I made a bunch and gave them away as gifts. The gifts were well received, and I even got a request to make one for someone else later on.*

So, a homemade eye pillow was one of the favorite gifts I ever received, and quite honestly, one of my favorite ones to give. I felt like I was giving such a personal gift because it is one made with my own hands.

Wondering how to make one? You can find step by step instructions on ehow.com. I didn’t do much more than email back then, so I did not have access to step-by-step instructions. Needless to say, I did not follow these exactly. Here’s what I did differently.

  • Used bird seed instead of flax seed
  • Left out the scented herbs
  • Made them 2-tone (meaning sewing all 4 sides instead of just 3)

The main thing is to make sure you do not over or under fill your pillow. You want it to have enough room to let the filling settle down over your eyes. If it has too much or too little filling, it won’t work very well. Hopefully you can get an idea of how full it should be by the pictures below. Let me know if you have questions. 🙂


*Unfortunately I can’t remember whether I ever followed through on that request. If you are reading this and requested an eye pillow that you did not receive, please let me know. 😐

Candice Goes in Circles

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Somehow Candice’s pacifier ended up on her shoulder, and it was so much fun that I grabbed my camera and put it there again. After she sees that we think it is funny she tries to put it back on her shoulder, but her aim is a bit off. She ends up trying to put it on her neck.

The interesting thing is the music. Pandora was playing in the background, but I wasn’t really listening during the video. While I was watching it later, I noticed that I stopped recording at the end of the song! Maybe I was subconsciously paying attention? Sounds good to me. I think I’ll keep the story! 🙂