i love my family! the girls and kurt were all looking cute for an Easter egg hunt this morning so i made them pose for a few pictures. i had to get a few of the girls with me for my class with ali edwards in iowa city next weekend. i can't wait!!!
as poor lisa and doris can attest, i have been really struggling with my pages lately. so i did a digi page last night for a challenge on the pub board. and it was fun! i might have to do a few more of them from time to time. and maybe do some mixed pages too. :) here are my digi sources!
the flower doodle is by the fabulous tia bennett at designer digitals.
the flowers and brads are by melany violette at simply clean digi scraps.
the papers are from the fun & funky kit by dana zarling at scrapbook bytes.
the girls' room, of course! lisa gave me the idea to make an art wall for the girls. (can you tell she always has the best ideas?!) and we finally got their curtain holdbacks and sparkly butterflies hung up. i made their wall hangings for them last year -- they were inspired by artwork from pottery barn kids. i just love their pink lamps! and they are touch lamps too --- how cool is that? lol!
here's a message from ella:
rjur5u65ujr4kvry43g5tfuj4u3fiyvlog4vf4jtgytvvyggyfy4gfr4fry
lisa loaned me her copy of "understanding exposure" by bryan peterson. sometimes i think i'm understanding it really well, and sometimes it looks like i have no clue what i'm doing! unfortunately i think i had more clueless pictures than good ones. guess i better keep studying!!! here are a few of the good, bad and uglies. :P (the ugly ones are first, in my opinion.) :P
do you ever feel that way? that things happen for a reason? when we heard we were moving 17 hours away from our home to san antonio, texas 3 years ago i was devastated. we were excited to get to discover a new place, but how could i take my parents' only grandchild away from them? how could i leave all of my friends and family? but we ARE in the air force so we had no choice.
so finally after a little over a year in texas with just one or two friends and not one with kids, i decided to find a hobby and find some way to meet people. so i started scrapbooking. one of my friends took me to the memory bucket, a local scrapbook store, and told me about the website two peas in a bucket. i wouldn't have ever imagined how much that day was going to change my life!
i was too nervous to post anything on the site for months. i was in awe of all of the beautiful pages in the gallery. i didn't even know there was a message board for a long time. but when i finally did find the message board, i discovered that there were tons of other scrapbookers that all lived close to me. i finally got the nerve to email kristin (or did she email me first?) only to discover that she lived about 5 minutes from my house. she invited me to go to a crop with her and her friends, and i had so much fun! they are such a great group of friends and they welcomed me with open arms to their group. it meant the world to me!!! they were and still are the most wonderful friends!!!
and then, of course, we got word that we were getting moved back to omaha. how was i going to leave all of my friends??? once again i was devastated. we still miss san antonio A LOT! (especially considering that a snowstorm is coming tonight. and this pregnant girl NEEDS some charlie's!) :) but we were moving back closer to our families so that helped soften the blow a little.
and through 2 peas my friend doris introduced me to gluestickgirl. our kids are the same age. she knew of a great preschool for anna - the same one where her little boy attends. i am usually so shy with new people at first, but with lisa it's like i've known her for a long time. and well, we kind of have through the message boards. but sometimes people are a little different than they seem on the boards. but not lisa! she is just as cool (if not MORE cool) in real life! our kids have so much fun playing together (when ella isn't being naughty - lol!) and sometimes they even let us scrap! and she is so generous with her talents --- she is such an inspiration and help to me!
and then she invited me to bagels with miley and kelly. and ella kicked kelly a few times and yelled at her and miley not to look at her. i was mortified!!! thankfully they didn't hold that against me (or didn't admit it, anyway - lol!). and they even let us come back. now ella loves "miss kelly" and "missmiley" (she says it as all one word) and even painted kelly a picture (now that is high praise from miss ella). :)
and last night we had a celebration at old chicago. i finally got to meet stef hamilton in 3d and to see becky novacek again. we had sooo much fun!!! we laughed and chatted and harassed our waitress for 3 hours. the time just flew by!!! i already feel so blessed to be able to call these girls friends. they are so much fun!!! and so genuine, honest, talented and inspirational. (they all have great pictures from last night on their blogs. in my rush out the door i forgot my camera. :P some scrapper i am!!!)
but what if we hadn't had to move to san antonio? and i wouldn't have started scrapping? and i wouldn't have heard about 2 peas? i wouldn't have the wonderful friendships, support and inspiration that i am SO lucky to have. i wouldn't have so much fun doing something i love to do so much and that hopefully the girls will appreciate some day. sure it's cost me a few $1000 in supplies - lol!!!! but some things are just meant to be.
or ella possessed? evil? or just grumpy. her mood can change in the blink of an eye. or a look from a stranger. she's just soooooo sweet when she's happy and soooooo not when she's mad.
LISA!!! what would i do without you? you have made moving to omaha soooo much fun!!! have a great day!!!
i knew it was going to be a good day when i walked outside and saw the first robins of spring in our lawn! well, they were the first i had seen, anyway. ella and i had bagels with lisa, miley, and kelly. what fun! our day kind of went downhill after than --- ella had a meltdown and the car wouldn't start when we went to leave preschool. thankfully it was warm and sunny outside so the girls could play with alex and ben until daddy came to rescue us. we got to play taxi for kurt after that, so we got to drive around in the sporty blue car with the sunroof open and our radio disney tunes cranked up loud. i'm sure the girls would have rather been at the park, but it was so fun for me! and they got to play with their neighborfriend when we got home, so all is good. and kurt did all of the laundry for me! what a guy!!!
today my oldest friend is coming to visit. and by oldest i mean we've known each other since we were 8. i can't wait! she's the one who taught me all about shopping --- especially at the baby gap and gymboree. :) so of course we are planning on shopping today. hopefully the guys won't mind staying home and watching basketball too much. :) go hawkeyes!
at school last week they asked the kids to count as high as they could, and anna made it to 100! she was so proud of herself! she has been counting for everyone she knows ever since. :)
all anna's designs! :) we are making 20 of the top card for her to give to her classmates. the heart was a family project for preschool. we all worked on it together. kurt and the girls glued on the sequins and buttons. i helped with the pictures and the ribbon. anna was so proud that she made the buttons into the letter "h." lol!
it was so nice and warm that we played outside today and i got a few good pictures. the winter sun and shade in omaha is definitely harder to work with than the bright sun in san antonio. or maybe it's just different --- i still have a lot to learn.
anna met 3 new neighborhood friends --- 2 girls and a boy that are just one year older than her. they were playing outside while their parents watched from inside. so i left them to play alone for awhile. that was the first time anna's ever been allowed outside alone. of course i was standing by the window almost the whole time. it was so hard for me to just let go! i can't believe she's growing up so fast! tonight we watched some old movies of her singing and dancing and it seemed like just yesterday. i'm so proud of her and what a sweet girl she's grown up to be. but there are times when i wish she could just stay 4 forever!
here are a few of our pictures from today, and last night. ella tried on my glasses and was working on suduko. lol! anna and ella were riding on kurt's back and calling him a lion. i wasn't sure how to explain to them that people usually don't ride on the backs of lions! :D
poor little ella. she's two. the terrible twos. she is just starting to go through the afternoon without a nap. but every day in the late afternoon she gets a case of the grumpies. she grunts and groans and yells at everyone. but sometimes she just says the funniest things! and when we laugh at her she gets even more grumpy! today i tried to talk to her and she said, "that's IT for talking!" i said, "ok. i love you!" and she yelled back in her grumpiest voice, "i love you too!" the other day i told her she was my precious angel, and she yelled back, "no i'm not! i'm hunny bunny!" no one can escape her grumpiness --- she yells at all of us and gives glares to total strangers. but after a little cuddle and a snack she's usually back to her sweet self. :)
what a wild two months it's been!!! between getting pregnant, moving, thanksgiving, christmas and the new year, we've been going non-stop! i'm finally over my morning sickness, for the most part, so we are allstarting to feel a little better. phew!
our first few weeks here were quite a whirlwind! what a move! it actually wasn't too bad, but i just don't like moving. i know, good thing i'm married to a military man - lol. the first night that we arrived at my mom's there were tornados about 30 miles north of us. two days after that there was a snowstorm. our things didn't arrive at our house until 7 days after we left san antonio, which was on a friday. of course we had to be in ankeny on that saturday, so kurt just went out by himself to direct the movers and the girls and i stayed at my mom and dad's. we finally came to our new house on sunday nov. 19th(?). a few hours after we got here tons of poicemen and a firetruck stopped just a few houses down. apparently there was a housebreak in and the owner walked in on the burglers. ack! so much for nice, safe Omaha. needless to say we had an alarm system installed the very next week!
we miss texas A LOT! but it is so great to be close to our families and friends. we love our new house! so many of our neighbors have welcomed us and a lot of them are even iowa fans! :D anna started going to preschool just a week or so after we moved into our house. her new school is structured quite a bit differently than her old school, and so far she really loves it and seems to be thriving. starting school one hour later than in texas seems to help us all! :)
on december 15th kurt and i were able to go to the u2 concert in omaha. it was amazing!!! i am always amazed at how awesome their music sounds in concert. so many songs that i thought were good on cd i just LOVED in concert. i'm not sure if this link will work (http://www.u2tours.com/displayfan.src?ID=20051215&XID=9827&Return=), but Beverly Brown could not have described the concert any better in her review on the U2tours.com website. the whole audience seemed to radiate a warm yet excited aura. here's a list of the songs they sang ---
Main Set: City of Blinding Lights, Vertigo - She Loves You, Elevation, I Will Follow, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For - In a Little While, Beautiful Day - Sgt. Pepper's, Original of the Species, Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own, Love and Peace or Else, Sunday Bloody Sunday - Rock the Casbah, Bullet the Blue Sky, Miss Sarajevo, Pride, Where the Streets Have No Name, One - All I Want Is You
Encore(s): Until the End of the World, Mysterious Ways, With or Without You, Stuck In a Moment You Can't Get Out Of, Crumbs From Your Table, Yahweh, 40
all of the songs were incredible! bono singing opera in miss sarajevo was incredible. i mean i knew his voice was amazing, but wow!!! stuck in a moment was done acoustically and it was even better than the original. during the concert people were encouraged to add their signatures to the one campaign --- http://www.one.org/. what an amazing cause. and just signing up gets you an email from bono. no kidding. the name in the sender line says bono. reason enough to sign up if you ask me! :D
we spent a week in ankeny over christmas. everyone in my family was home. what a treat! the girls had such a great time playing with their uncles. the boys never had to play barbie when they were little since they outnumbered me 3 to 1, but my girls made them more than make up for that over christmas. :D we were able to spend time at kurt's family on friday night, go to mass late saturday afternoon, and then open presents on saturday night. it was so fun to see the girls' expressions when they opened the presents they were hoping to get. anna made a christmas ornament at school and gave it to us as a present. i think it's the best one i've ever gotten!
ok - it's sad that i wrote more about the u2 concert than all of christmas. lol! but christmas was just so laid back and relaxing. i'll have to post christmas pictures and the details about them soon. and new house pictures too. happy new year!!!
