4X12: October 2011

This year I made sure we got ourselves out to the local corn maze. Not only did we have an afternoon full of crazy maze fun, we also went home with a giant bag of apples, half a dozen pumpkins, 2 gallons of fresh apple cider, some acorn squash, and various peppers.

4x12: September 2011

September was a crazy month, what with school starting and all. Now that The Girl is in High School our days are all wonky. It's going to take us some time to adjust the new schedule. So this month's picture was a few days late in being taken. Every time I wanted to head out to take the pictures the weather turned or someone had to be somewhere or people were cranky ( like me! ). It's becoming more and more of a challenge to find good places to take these family photos. With winter on its way we're going to have to think inside the box!

4x12: August 2011

Here it is! The August family picture. We're 8 months into this challenge and they still complain every time I announce "family picture time". Maybe by next year they'll be used to it?

4x12: May, June, July 2011

May 2011: I realized on our way out the door to the kids baseball/softball games that it was the last day of the month and we still needed our family picture! Three of us have lived in these uniforms all month, so this is a good representation of our lives right now.

June 2011: The seasonal campers are in full swing at the campground now. We've been spending the weekends hanging out around the fire. I grabbed this one really quickly while hanging out and goofing around.

July 2011: This was taken at a wedding reception. I was hoping the kids would agree to dress up a bit more. But I'll take what I can get!

Spring Ball

Baseball season is fully underway, and with both kids playing this spring, our schedules are overly packed. We've had a game or practice 6 days out of 7 for the last 3 weeks! Sometimes, the kids have games on the same day, which means Dad takes Little Man and I take The Girl. Plus, The Mr. is a Coach this year so he really needs to be at every game even if Little Man isn't playing that day.


It's difficult for me to get photos of Little Man since I often do the scorebook. So I'm going to have to take a game off here and there so I can get some more pictures of him in action.

This is The Girl's first year playing on a team. Because they offer a girls softball league here, they wouldn't let her play baseball. She was not happy. And the coaches are having a hard time retraining her! She doesn't throw like a girl :)

And she loves to slide! Here I caught her stealing home. Which she does quite often. She's also managed to get pretty banged up while doing it. That's my Girl :)

Little Man's 13th Birthday

The Big 13! I can't believe it. The day started off with a light breakfast. We then went to a movie, and CiCi's for lunch. While at lunch, Little Man opened some gifts.

After lunch we did a little shopping, got some DQ and then headed to the Silver Hawks game. We had a birthday message put on the board. I think they should give us a refund since they misspelled his name :( During the 7th inning stretch Little Man got to play a relay game. He wasn't too thrilled with how it went down. But you can't tell from the grin on his face!

Later that weekend we had a little family party and I made the obligatory baseball themed cake. I think this makes 4 years in a row?

Next year he says I just have to make a baseball stadium just like they did on Ace of Cakes! I think I'd best start planning now...

4x12: April

Once again I found myself scrambling to get in a picture. I almost have to make sure we have a big event scheduled sometime during the month to get us all in the same place at the same time. Hopefully with the warmer weather we'll have more opportunities for fun family photos :)


I had the Pastor snap this for me. We were all meeting up at the church that afternoon to send the youth group to the Aquire the Fire conference in Lansing. So while we were waiting for everyone to show up, I asked the family to sit for our monthly photo :)

The "Anti-virus" Virus

A few weeks ago all three of our laptops got zapped with this nasty virus. Talk about chaos! By the time we realized what was happening, the virus had eaten all of my photo files that were saved on Little Man's computer, since I use his computer for all of my online work. (My personal computer died a year ago and has not been replaced yet.) The Girl's laptop got so messed up it wouldn't let us update or reinstall her virus protection software. She can no longer go online for ANY reason. Then the Mr's laptop got attacked and acted all wonky, but he managed to get rid of the virus before any real damage was done. So Little Man's computer suffered the most damage. And I was very upset. Losing all of my photos makes me very angry.

The funny thing is, the computer said all those files were still there. But when we searched for the files all we got were empty file folders. Grrr...

Yesterday, (being Mother's Day), I had the afternoon all to myself, just as I do every Sunday afternoon. I sat down to work on balancing the checkbook and make entries into my Quickbooks program. And guess what? The virus ate those too!

So I went to the help site for Quickbooks to see if there was a way to recover them. Turns out there is. So I read the directions a half dozen times and took a shot at it. Unfortunately, I didn't recover my financial records. BUT, I used the same procedure to search for my photo files, on the off chance it might work, and I found myself grinning from ear to ear as every single missing file began filling up my window! I could have gotten up and danced a jig, except I didn't want to take a chance that they'd disappear again! So I recovered all of my photo files and then plugged the computer into the external backup and copied ALL of those files. Now I know they are all safe and sound if another virus decides to attack. Which is more than likely. Sadly.

So everyone learn a lesson here: Go back up your computers!

Now I just need some luck finding those financial files...

The Mr's 40th Birthday

He wanted a little cake with a lot of candles. All for effect :)

4x12: March

Better late than never, I suppose! Not having my own computer to work with really hampers my creative time online. One of these days, I'm sure I'll break down and buy a new computer. In fact, it'll probably be sooner rather than later...

March 31 was the Mr's 40th Birthday! To celebrate we blew up 40 balloons after he went to bed so that when he woke up in the morning he would have a birthday surprise. It worked out pretty well. But when it came time to take pictures we found that most of the balloons wouldn't float any higher than our heads. So we blew up the rest of the balloons to give us a nice big bunch for the pictures. So the Mr's birthday pictures are pulling double duty this year!



A simple family picture turned into quite the production. Little Man turned his funny bone on its side and gave me plenty of photo ops:


He's such a goof ball! I suppose that's because he takes after his father...



Even The Girl got in on the fun!

Project 365

Opening page of the 2011 Album.

Project 365 is well under way. I've been doing a lot more digital work this year. Some of the pictures I use for the everyday shots come with a few more pictures I'd like to include, so I'm making extra pages to put into the binder. I'm also adding a lot more ephemera. There's so much stuff sometimes! I have a bunch of layouts at the printer right now. I can't wait til they get here so I can get the binder caught up! I sometimes wish I could print my pictures everyday, but I know that it just isn't economical, and definitely not practical to our lifestyle. So once a month I send in my order and once a month it feels like Christmas when I open my package and see all the memories!

Spring has almost Sprung!

It's almost time! We went out to the RV park this past weekend and got the RV put back into place, all lined up and ready to hook up for the summer. We didn't have time, or the suppies, to do any cleaning, but that will come soon enough! We have lots to do!

New Polish Color

"Flat Iron Green" by NYC In a New York Color Minute, Quick Dry Nail Polish

Okay, so I saw this color in a magazine and immediately fell in love with it. In the light it's very green, but without the benefit of UV, it's an almost black color! I just had to find it! So, I scoured the shelves until I found it on the very bottom of the display at the local Wally-World. I thought for sure this would become my new favorite polish. But I was completely unprepared for this. I expected, with it being one of those 60-seconds-to-dry type polishes, that it would also be a one-coat polish. WRONG! It took 4 coats total. And it dries so fast, sometimes I couldn't get the entire nail painted before the drying kicked in. Lots of streaking going on.

On the up side, it didn't chip right away like most polishes. A couple days after applying it, I trimmed my nails and gave them another coat. And now it's the color, and coverage, I want! While not technically a "spring" color, it does a good job of playing with spring. This probably won't be one of my go-to polishes since it takes so many coats before it's looking pretty, but when I have the time for multiple coats, it'll be right up there at the top of my list.

Something pretty...

to look at! found on pinterest. A very cool website!

I would love to have the chair and mirror in my master suite...that is, ehem, if I had a master suite...

Literally Literary

I love a good book. Good books seem to be hard to find anymore. I peruse the shelves of the local libraries for hours on end sometimes and only find a gem or two to take home and curl up with for a spell. It seems I have to search longer and harder these days to find something enjoyable.

Today I discovered a web page that just may change all that. It's called Good Reads. Why didn't I think to look for something like this a long time ago?! So many books! So little time!

My reading list for 2011 is quite sparse. My reading time this year has been pathetic. But I hope to change all of that. I hope to scope out some good reads in the near future and buff up my reading list real quick like...

And if anyone out there has any favorites to suggest... please do!

Crazy Cake Adventures

No one should take on two really important cakes the morning after getting back from a vacation. But, lucky me, the Mr. didn't give me much of a choice. I had to bake and decorate these cakes in less than 24 hrs! I baked cakes from 7 - 10:30 pm one night and went back to frost at 7am the next day! Craziness indeed. And I didn't get to make all the decorations I wanted to make. I was seriously dissapointed. But I did have fun working the frosting designs. I'd like to make some more of these...but mini-sized! Wouldn't they be so cute?!

This is a 2-layer, 14" strawberry cake with buttercream frosting, decorated with stippling.

This is a 2-layer, 9" strawberry cake with butter cream frosting, decorated with ribbon swirls.

I really, really wanted to make some chocolate butterflies to set on top, but I just plain ran out of time and I was soooo tired from the trip I just couldn't function. I guess I'll save that little bit of fun for some other time.

Vacation!

First things first: a good lunch! When in Atlanta, Georgia it is essential that we eat sushi.
While the Mr. was out working, the kids and I hung out with John at one of the local malls. There were some pretty fun things to do. The kids were super psyched to race the radio control cars for a little while.

And then they just had to climb the rock wall at Cabella's. It was quite the challenge for both of them. Little Man had some difficulty with the holds being a little too far apart. The Girl made it up the wall waaaay further than any other person who attempted it that day. Girls got skillz!


On the way out Little Man shook hands with some of the local wildlife...

And then we were off to Orlando. First stop: Braves vs. Tigers Spring Training Game. It was quite a snoozer up until the 9th inning and just when it was getting interesting, the game was over! Little Man was stoked to watch Chipper Jones play.

Then we went to the WGLL Opening Ceremonies. Little Man hung out with some of his friends while The Girl caught up with some of her friends.

That night we went to Universal Studios. Our first stop was the Hogwarts Express! I wish it was an actual ride you could take into Hogsmeade. I haven't seen it during daylight hours, but at night it's pretty magical!

And then it was time for the Mardi Gras parade. The Girl came away with another 50 necklaces, at least!

And no trip to Universal is complete without picking up breakfast on the way out! mmm...

The next day we did the Universal thing again, but the kids took one of their friends with them. They wanted to be left alone, so the Mr. and I went Ninja on them! It was too much fun :)

And then we were back in Atlanta, needing something to eat late at night. Way to be there, Panda!

Next day, the Mr. had to work so the kids and I hung out at Dave&Busters. What a cool place! Unfortunately, we spend way too much money there. But it was a lot of fun :)

And then the trip home. We all found the rivers and waterfalls along the roadways to be beautiful. The kids and I usually try to sleep through the hills so we don't get sick, but it was just too pretty to miss!


Vacation is nice, but home is heavenly...you'd think that was the end of the week, but no, we were home for only a day and a half before we had to pack up and be gone for the weekend! The Mr. and I were asked to be chaperones for the Acquire the Fire conference so we didn't get any rest until several days after vacation. Man, were we wiped out! So glad to have my own pillow again...

Are these your glasses, Mom?!

I may be old, little man, but I'm not that old!

Saturday, February 28th, our friends and family tricked us into showing up for a surprise party to celebrate our 40th birthdays. Mine passed by on the 6th and the Mr's will be coming up on March 31st. So somewhere in the middle totally caught us off guard! Well done, people, well done.



I like this. My sis-in-law really loves me. She came up with 20/20 just for me! The Mr. gets stuck with the Big 4-0.

It was really great to see so many of our friends make the trip for our party. It has been too many years since we last saw each other. We can't let that happen again. Thank you, friends and family, for all the hard work putting the party together and actually managing to keep it a secret! Well done, indeed. :)

Ice, Ice, Baby

Well, then. A frozen winter became a close encounter with spring for 5 warm days, and then BAM! ice storm! and back to winter we go...

I would have preferred to take some ice photos with sunshine, but it wasn't meant to be. We didn't get any sun for 3 days and by then the ice was gone. So I'm glad I took the time to get these pictures when I did. It was bitter, bitter cold outside and my fingers were sore cold. They hurt so bad and I thought I might have gotten frostbite. But luckily they warmed up nicely and everything works :) I need some photographers gloves. Do they make those? I wonder...