Weekend Pictures

Just wanted to pop in and share some pictures from this weekend! We've had a fun couple of days! Friday was my day off, and after bringing and picking Braelyn up from school we did lunch with Dad at good ole Taco Bell. When we got home we played outside for a while because it was so warm - the girls loved riding their bikes and scooters and just enjoying the outdoors. I tired them all out for naps and then at night we went to Fun Night at Braelyn's school. That was a good time, but it was quite warm in the school and with three kids it just ended up getting hectic, so we went with Chad and Julie and the all the kids to Pizza Hut for dinner after playing a few games. On Saturday morning we got up and got ready to run errands. We first went to the tanner so I could tan (whoohoooo for me getting a little tan - I am normally pasty!!! Amazing what a slight tan can do for my conscience!). After I tanned we headed to Paint-A-Pot for the girls to make new dinner plates. Selah's last plate she did broke so we figured we'd have them each do a new one. That was quite hectic too with three little ones. Gracyn really has been quite fussy lately - can't barely handle it. Anyway - they got their plates done and we can pick them up next week - I'll have to take photos of them! Then we did our little Meijer/grocery store run. The girls had won a fish each at the Fun Night so we went to get a tank and some food - we got them all set up in their room - I think they will like it - we'll see if they live! Right from there we had to rush home, unpack goodies, shower, kids down for naps and be ready to go out for the night by 2:30. We made it happen and Kyle's mom was here at 2:30 with my niece and nephews for a big night of babysitting 6 kids!!! We got to go to see Sawyer Brown in concert in Indiana. The drive there is about 2 big hours and we wanted to do dinner when we got there. It was such a fun time! I loved being out with just adults - although I can't say it was a quiet evening! The ride there was nice and quiet and relaxing, as was the dinner. The concert was energetic and loud, and then the ride home was loud b/c I drove the guys all back and they liked to jam. I did love just listening to the music though - good music night! Did I mention that we got to go backstage and do the Meet and Greet?! Sarah (she has more pics on her blog!) gets us great tickets b/c her brother knows Mark Miller so we got to meet him (again!) See below for some fun pictures!

Mark Miller - lead singer - Sawyer Brown (also the producer? for Casting Crowns! Can see the story HERE if you are interested!)

Kyle and I with Mark

Kyle and I - date night!!!!

The group of gals with Mark (me, Sarah, Mark, Lisa, and Missy)

Mark in concert - he's a great dancer!!!

Anyway - so it's been a fun weekend so far, and church was great this morning. We are also so so lucky to live in the same city as this organization and Dan Seaborn! He is an awesome person and such an inspiring speaker. He has such an enthusiastic longing to help people make great families and marriages. So tonight we are going to this event. Should be awesome and Mark Harris is performing! How lucky am I??? God is good!

Here are some new LO's from me! These two great kits came out this weekend! I am getting so excited for National Scrapbook Day too - this coming weekend!!!

This LO was done with the Lilypad Collab between Natalie Braxton and Emily Merrit - huge adorable kit!

This LO (I think one of my favorites to date) was done with Shabby Miss Jenn's new kit Hipster Mom (I am totally going to get great use our of this huge kit!!! Of course all credits on both LO's can be seen in my gallery!

OK - I've talked your ear off - have a great night and a good start to a new week!

Misc. Info.

So I just deleted a whole long written out story about things that have been going on and I deleted it! Not sure why, just feeling uninspired to share. Is that odd? Do you ever have that? Anyway - it was about our new van, selling out old tahoe, people being semi-interested in our house - stuff like that. We have been totally having some raw emotions with God lately and He has been showing us some raw emotion back - which is super cool! Good stuff!

Gracyn is almost 7 months old, which is amazing to me. I am going to start weening her from nursing, and for numerous reasons. I would love to do it for a year, but I did about 7-8 months with both other girls and that is where I seem to cap it. I know the benefits are so good and I am glad I have done it for over 6 months. Now I only have to buy a couple months of formula. I get to go to Florida with my girlfriends in mid May and I don't want to be pumping while on vacation either - isn't that selfish? :) She's doing great though. I keep thinking she is teething b/c she does get super fussy sometimes, but I remember always blaming fussiness on teething. I've never had major droolers so it's not that I think she's teething for reasons like that, I guess it's just fun for us moms to speculate.

Braelyn is with Daddy at a father's night at school - she was so excited. I am sure they will have fun. I kept telling her she has a date with daddy! Selah is just being Selah - talking a TON - I swear she says about every book in the dictionary. She keeps right up with her sister. Her hair is finally long enough to do cute piggy's too - I love that stage!

So that's life - not much else I can think about. Happy earth day - hope you have all decided to do something "green" today. I have not done anything major, just little things like turning off lights, using the special light bulbs, can't wait to get our garden going, etc.... I think we will try to involve the girls in that more this summer - they love that stuff!

Pretty common week around here. Another showing tomorrow at 4:00 if you could just pray that that goes good - second time thru for these folks. Fri. night we are going to a fun night at B's school, and then Sat. I think we may be going to Indiana to see Sawyer Brown!!! We have gone every year for about 4 years or so now - with Sarah, and it's a blast - we usually get to meet the band and stuff before hand!!! So we are working out sitters for that and that should make for a full weekend!

OK - off to clean!

Toodles!

Scrapbooking Class

So, as I was browsing blogs I see a lot of people I know in my area that have gotten into scrapbooking digitally in some way. Be it making blog headers or actual pages. And I got to thinking again and wondering if there would be interest again in a digital scrapbooking class of sorts. So if you have a computer and would maybe have interest in this type of thing please give me a shout out and let me know if there is of interest. The last time we had a class we held it at DeBoer Bakery & Cafe on Lakewood and they have a great room they let us use and we went over some basics of Photoshop and scrapbooking. We had some great freebies that some of my designer friends donated (and don't blame me if they made you a patron of theirs forever ;) and it was a great time. So, maybe there is no interest, but I just thought I would check. I see a lot of people at least making blog headers and stuff like that digitally. Fun stuff and I LOVE teaching it!

So, I am culinary challenged - did you all know that? I cannot cook for the life of me. I attempt things, and they just don't turn out. Totally burnt a roast on Mon. I even pray that God just allow something to turn out just once, and it doesn't - LOL! Maybe I am approaching it all wrong - who knows. My cookies I made this week tasted good, but they didn't look the best. The only things that I can make really good are my chicken enchiladas and my chicken bake that Kyle and I love - that's about it. So, we grill alot. Only problem with that is that our grill SUCKS!!! It is just getting old (it's over 7 years old), and that would be fine if it was a great quality grill, but it was a basic average grill (Sarah and Jen - I know you got it for us as a wedding gift and that is awesome - it's just that it has seen it's day - KWIM?) So anyway - I am sure you all didn't care to know all that, but it's been on my mind b/c I just want to be a good wife and mother and I wish I could cook and bake better. My sister Tammy is like Martha Stewart when it comes to her kitchen - in fact - I think she's even better than Martha!!!

What great weather we have been having here lately!!! I just got in from being outside with the girls swinging and riding bikes and all that good stuff! Gracyn is at a GREAT age for this stuff and just in time!!! I also have been busy cleaning my house today b/c we hav a couple coming thru it that might be interested. The nice thing is is that they moved here from Colorado and they have been living in an apartment, so no house for them to sell (well - they do have a house in CO that will be closing next month.) So it is kind of unexpected since we have not been really planning on pushing the sale of ours a whole lot. Just a simpl sign in the yard, figuring if it goes it goes. MI house market is just so so bad, so we'll see. not really expecting much. It is kind of nice to have to do good cleanings like this every so often!!! Looks so nice and sparkly! I love me a clean house! Makes my stress level go way down. We have small group tonight so not real sure how we are going to work that yet - Kyle will have to come back and show the house I think. No real plans tomorrow, just playing and having fun!

Here is a LO I have from today's new releases at The-Lilypad!

Braelyn loves to play with the kitchen set at school - they have tons of food and kitchen tools for them to play with and when I was special helper with Braelyn I got a few pictures of her playing! Kate's Fast Food Doodles were perfect for the LO! Big ole HALL OF FAMER Amy put out some super cute alphas late in the game too - so I didn't get to use them, but I am super excited to play! They would have been perfect on this LO so I may have to add them in!

OK - have a great weekend everyone! Toodles!

Sunshiney Day

Weather has finally taken a turn here in Michigan I think! I know, I know...we're weeks and weeks behind some of you other folks who are in the 70's year round, but this is big for us! Tomorrow and Thur. are supposed to be high 60's here!!! I can MAYBE start wearing the cute new skirts I got!!! I refuse to wear my winter coats anymore now and the sandles are coming out folks! It's so fun to watch the girls start playing outside again. Braelyn can't stand anything getting dirty, so I think I have a girly girl on my hands. She had one spot on her underwear Sunday morning and she pitched a fit. I had to have a little talk with her , and she got over it, but man - I feel like I am dealing with a teenager lately.

Gracyn had her 6 month well child check-up today. Everything looked great the Dr. said - I think she was just above average on everything - I don't remember all the exacts. She is not quite 20 lbs. yet, so we will keep her in her infant carseat for a bit longer! She is sitting up all by herself which is a great phase. She is content to sit and play with toys now for a while, and for me it is just fun to play with her down on the floor like that. The older girls love it too that they can interact with her more when she is sitting up and playing. Gracyn also has become a great eater. She has been introduced to rice and oatmeal, sweet potato, squash, carrots, peas, peaches, pears, bananas, and applesauce. I think this week we will try prunes - all my girls seemed to like those. In the past I have always made a majority of my girls' baby food, but now I am not sure when I will get the time, and obviously it was more fun to do it with fresh farmers market fruit and veggies - I can't wait for that to open and start back up again in Holland!!!

Here are some things I have been working on lately.

Selah's sippy cup insert (the stitched flowers that overhang here obviously got cut off)
Braelyn's new sippy cup insert


My Starbuck's mug summer insert

My LO for this week's Lilypad Blog challenge. The challenge is to scrap some sort of anniversary and I chose the anniversary of becoming a family. Next month is Braelyn's 4th birthday and when I saw this picture I am just amazed at how fast it has gone!

LO using SMJ's new kit Lil Guys, and a template by Katy Larson at Kissed Studio

And this one is of Gracyn moving up to the duck tub - so fun!!! All Lilypad goodies here - including the template by Amy Martin! Did you all happen to see that Amy made Creating Keepsakes Hall of Fame for 2008 - that is HUGE!!! Congrats Amy!

Hope you are all having a great week!

Layouts

It's been a long time since I posted LO's I think. Here are a few of my latest! The first two are done with all the goodies from the BYOC at The Lilypad! Another GREAT Collab from there!!! This first one is for the Lilypad Blog challenge this week - scrap your family outtake photos! Kyle and the girls went into a photo booth at The Great Wolf Lodge a while back. He brought me back these photos. You know you have a lot of kids when you try to squeeze them all into the pic! :) What a blessing right?!

This LO is done using a template by Janet Phillips - her April Grab bag is dynamic, as always! It is available until tomorrow - April 8! The kit is a new Collab with Shabby Miss Jenn and Susan Bartilloni. SMJ also has some new stuff up at her shop along with this kit! Such shabby yummy goodies!

Sorry I have been absent from the blog (my brother tells me never to apologize for that b/c this is just my journal - so I guess I am actually not sorry). My oh so dear husband has been on me for being on the computer too much so again - I am trying to scale down on some things. I am quite flattered really that my husband wants to spend time with me - I can't complain about that for one minute. But anyway - when I am on here I want/need to be scrapping so the blog might turn into more of a LO posting blog - not so much everyday life. Although seeing the LO's will give you a glimpse into our everyday life. I will also put things on here that I want to remember too, so who knows - maybe it won't change much - LOL! I haven't been commenting on blogs as much either - just know that I am still reading when my feeds update!

We had a great shopping trip this weekend - me and hubby! Ahhhh, it was so fun to be just us two! I got some great things at Banana Republic, Ann Taylor, J Crew, and Tommy Hilfiger! Mind you they were all outlets, so I could actually buy the stuff. I don't spend money on shopping like that very often so it was so fun!!! The girls got some great stuff from Gymboree and children's place! Kyle made out like a rat at Banana Republic, J Crew, American Eagle, and Old Navy! Now it's back to a normal work week. Alot of MI people are on spring break right now so it's very quiet around here this week!

Have a good week everyone!