decorating

So, while Kev was in CA this past week we decided to surprise him and get the tree decorated. The whole idea was a bad one . . . after they unpacked the entire tub of decor (before I even got into the living room) and broke numerous glass ornaments, Gennie dropped my camera and burst into tears and Jo tried to "plug in" our wire star into the wall outlet (caught that one just in time!) . . . so we got the lights on, the red balls hung and the stockings up, then called it a night.

Jo still thinks the reindeer antler headpiece is a really big necklace and insists on wearing it around his neck at all times.

It's a good thing they are cute. Gennie saved the star for Daddy to put up when he got home so he could be in on the decorating. Sweet girl.

crazy busy.

So, i'm trapped behind the kitchen table working on christmas presents and haven't even gotten my camera out in a few days. i did shoot the kids decorating the tree and those photos will be ready soon. also, g has her first school christmas program tomorrow night so the pictoral proof of that cuteness will be coming, too.

back to the confines of the sewing machine area.

o christmas tree, once again

So, on Friday after we got the phone call telling us Pat had passed away, we decided to keep our plans to go tree-hunting . . . Kev and I decided there wasn't anything we could do for Kim from here and it would be better to get out of the house and distract the kids from their tears . . . so we and my parents packed up the cars, got Subway for lunch and trekked into Utah to find a tree.
The kids spent most of their time eating snow and throwing it at each other.




J loved riding in the backpack again . . . Kev's own little barnacle:And G and I had to finish the day with snow angels.Oh, and as I was going thru the photos from the day I found this gem. I'm going to print it really big and put it in the kids' rooms when they misbehave . . . with a little sign that says "Daddy's watching you!"Granted, neither of them could read the sign yet but I think the photo should do the job . . . for now.

sadness.

For those of you who didn't hear on Facebook, Kev's step-dad passed away suddenly on Friday morning. Long story short, he was in a motorcycle accident about 3 weeks ago and was seriously injured. He was released from the hospital and was home for a few days but collapsed on Thursday and was readmitted. They found blood clots near his lungs and the next morning he passed.

We are all very sad about the loss of Pat. Kev is planning to fly out for the funeral this weekend. Needless to say I've not been in the bloggin' mood these last few days but I'll be back soon with photos from our tree-cutting expedition.

Thanks for all your prayers, especially for Kim, Kev's mom. We love you all!

a semi-quiet morning

So, this is what we find most Saturday mornings. Cereal and J's juice cup watching Mickey Mouse's Clubhouse on Disney.

Back in our day . . . did I really just say "our day"? how old am I? . . . it was Smurfs and Snorkels and Gummi Bears and Garfield & Friends . . . back before all the Japanamation and South Park. Ah, those were cartoons. I'd even settle for Looney Tunes with Wyle E. Coyote and the RoadRunner.

Shortly after this photo was taken there were shrieks of "Get off my foot!" and "Nennie, move over!" and cereal spilled on the floor which the dog immediately pounced on and they both came running in to tell on the other.

But for a minute it was just Saturday morning cartoons and cereal. Together.

Kellhofers - sneak peek

So, I finally got these finished. Love 'em!!

When we were finished with that little sweetie, it was time for a walk in the park.

Thanks again, guys! As always it was a pleasure to shoot you . . . er, well, you know what I mean. Love ya!

because I'm a stinker . . .

Here's the teaser. Now you just have to wait! Hee Hee Hee!

"somewhere over the rainbow - you've got mail!"

So, here's our halloween! G decided to be Dorothy from Wizard of Oz, complete with Toto riding in his basket (and eating her candy).

And J was dressed up as his favorite person in the whole wide world - Dave, our mailman! Everyday he paces in front of our window waiting for Dave to come with the mail so Kev thought it'd be cute to make him a little letter carrier.

Yes, it was still light out when we started but that's when you get the best photos - so sue me!

After showing off to Grandma and Grandaddy and surprising their neighbors, we went with the Bundy's to the Trunk or Treat. Every year a church in town has all their people drive over and park in their huge parking lot to hand out candy from the back of their cars. At first we were all really wary of the idea - seemed like a child-abductor's dreamworld . . . "Come here, little children, and let me distract you with this candy while I stuff you in the trunk of my car!" - but it was really well-lit and we stayed with them and they ended up with a ton of candy without the bother of going door to door. Sorry it's blurry - I guess I was excited (or shivering):

After that we went back to the Bundy's for a party and hung out until Josiah was beyond sleepy and turning into a pumpkin. Had a fantastic time - I love any reason to hang out with friends and eat caramel-covered Cheetos! (Yes, that's really what I said and it's amazing!)

Coming soon: a photo of our little mail carrier with his role model!

my new favorite photo of us

So, to put it mildly, Valerie freakin' rocks!

She shoots,

I photoshop,

and this is the new fantastic-ness that gets hung on my wall.

That's why I love this time of year - The Great (Annual) Family Portrait Trade-Off. I shoot her family and then it's our turn. Then we each take our camera cards home and hit the photoshop to make them just how we want them without the hassle of prying them from an outside photographer's hot little hand. Love it! It's totally a blessing to have a close friend to do this trade-y thing with - and she's even able to get a smile out of Kev at least once during the shoot. (And this time we even got more than one out of him!)

Thanks friend~you're the best!

More to come from this shoot soon -- but I'm gonna make you wait until after halloween photos and maybe even until our Christmas cards go out. Yeah, I'm mean like that. :)

Can you guess what we were for Halloween?

Photos to come!

"what was that?" "believe it or not, personal growth!" - Leonard from The Big Bang Theory tv show

So yesterday I was reading one of my fav blog-lurking sites . . . yes, it was about scrapping . . . are you really that surprised? . . . and the chick was lamenting the fact that she, like so many other scrappers, spends all of her time behind the camera instead of in front of it. She finished with a challenge to us all to hand off the camera to someone, anyone, including our small children, to take a photo or two of us for a potential page. Riddled with guilt for always coming up with an excuse to take the photos . . . hair's not done quite right, no lipstick, it won't be framed like I want it (wow, that's just stuck-up now, isn't it?), Kev doesn't understand why I need 40 photos of the kids doing this so I'd better just do it myself, etc. . . I decided to wait until Gennie got home and see if she could take a new photo for my Facebook profile. And really, I'm almost never seen on here so it was about time to do a photo of me.

I've got to admit handing over my camera to her was quite a leap for me, and don't give me too much credit, this is just my little point-and-shoot, not my big camera (I'm leaping, not crazy!!) :

Honest to goodness, this photo wasn't staged to make a point. This was the first shot she took . . . I thought she had snapped the photo already because she moved the camera and I just knew she was going to drop it on the front porch . . . turns out she didn't press the button hard enough, hence the moving camera. She held on to it just fine, tho, and shot several pretty good pictures in the 5 minutes we were out there. The keeper is the one up at the top.

I guess I can be a little more trusting with her. She hangs on much tighter than I first thought . . . and doesn't protest NEAR as much as her daddy!

Miss S - sneak peek

Here they are, Katie, finally! Thanks for your patience!

I loved working with this little cutie - she had me running all over the park. Very independant~ and I loved it!!

Thanks again, Katie and Joe!

self-worth and potty training .... not necessarily linked

So, last night we had a mtg with the State Farm guy to talk about life insurance. Before any of you freak out and go directly to "OMG, who's dying?!" let me reassure you that we are just preparing, not anticipating. As Kev puts it, he's recently decided he'd better start taking care of his health situations instead of just enduring them as they come up so we made an appt to go over all the various life insurances he has and what, if anything, needed to be added. Our agent came to the house . . . I know, who does THAT anymore? great guy, that agent . . . so that we didn't have to try to corral the kids in his office and we talked for almost 2 hours. He filled out the application on Kev and wow, the health questionnaire, so now we just have to wait and see if the underwriters will approve it. Easy peasy.

We had asked him to prep a quote for some insurance on me, too, since I don't have anything in place yet. This is where it got funny . . . not funny "Ha Ha" but funny ironic. He put down that I'm a homemaker . . . a term which I used to dispise because it sounded like people (not just moms) who stay home don't actually produce anything that could be considered adding to the Gross National Product so "let's give it some credibility by saying they "make the home", but now I don't mind because let's face it: I haven't actually stayed home all day in months so the term "Stay-at-home Mom" doesn't really fit. Later in the application it asked for my monthly income and had a little chart showing that by State Farm standards what I do is equal to $46,000 or so a year. He gave all kinds of qualifying excuses for that and tried to dismiss it away as a gross underestimation of how much moms are really worth. Really, I wasn't offended. That stuff doesn't bother me because I know a housekeeper/babysitter/chauffer/cook would cost a bunch more than the occasional "trip to the scrapbook store."

But what really made me chuckle to myself was that we were discussing a life insurance policy of $100 grand on me . . . meaning dead I'm worth just more than twice what I am worth alive. Fantastic! I do understand that that's kind of how it works with insurance and most people who have it are worth more dead than alive in terms of actual money in hand. But that $100 grand would not go very far in the event I did kick it and Kev had to immediately find a housekeeper/cook/babysitter.

And Kev says that I have no real choice but to stick around because with all his health issues and keeping all the drs and info straight it would take altogether too long to train a "new one." (Before any of you call to demand he appologizes for such a comment, I made sure he was just kidding. Trust me.)

Anyway, all of this just kind of made me laugh. Nothing like having someone put a price on you.

Oh, and we're gonna try potty training very soon. The potty seat has been bought, the Pull-Ups are in his room -- now we just have to do it!

and we're back.

So, after a bunch of photo editing that wasn't for personal use at all, I finally finished and now have time for me-stuff again. :) Last week was Fall Break for Gennie and Kev (it coincides with the opening of hunting season here but technically we aren't allowed to call it Hunting Holiday, even tho that's what it is) so we went to Salt Lake City for a quick vacation/dr appt for Kev. The appts went well and sorted some things out for him so that part was an answer to prayer. He's doing well and shouldn't have to return for 3 months or so unless something comes up. In between the 3 separate appts he had that day we decided to let the kids run off some energy at a random park we came across. All that riding in the car was soon forgotten and they had a great time chasing each other down the slide.

And everyone knows it's much more fun to go down butt-first with your legs out the side:

Love these beautiful kids!