Spring Break

This past week was Malia's spring break. It was a ton of fun! Justin headed out to WV to speak at a church and took Pressley along with him. I stayed home and spent my days hanging out with Isabella and my nights slumber partying with Malia. It was really great having some special one on one time with the girls and also watching Malia and Isabella spend some special time together as well. Isabella and I had a special fun photo shoot day and read tons of books together. Yesterday we wrapped up the day as a family by spending the day in Bay City at the Planetarium, sharing a smoothie and eating lunch/dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings.

Top 11 of 2011

We had an awesome Christmas break...I spent time with every person I really love from WV to Pgh to OH! It was so fun! So as a toast to 2011, here are the highlights of the year...especially since the year ended a billion times better than it started! (in no particular order...)

1. Kinsey Mae!
2. NKOTBSB with my sister!
3. Land contract on the house!
4. Photography opportunities!
5. Being back in a house!
6. Trips with just Justin!
7. Malia can read and ride a bike!
8. My grandma turning 80!
9. Running 10 miles with my BFF!
10.Girls weekend and vacations!
11.10 years of marriage!!!

Bowers Family Restraunt

For lunch today I set up tables for the girls to sit at and gave them "menu" books and took their orders. Today's special was pigs in a blanket. I took their orders, brought the food and for dessert we had chocolate cake for Isabella's pretend birthday. So fun!

Camping and WV Trip Highlights

*Malia climbing Potato Knob
*Justin riding the Shoot
*Swinging in the hammock with the girls
*Skipping rocks with Pressley
*Hiking with Justin
*Cool wildlife-butterflies in groups, deer, red mushrooms with white spots, snails, millipede
*star gazing with the girls
*shooting stars
*coming home to a rainbow in the backyard

Beach Trip!

We had a blast this week sharing a beach house with my parents, sister, brother-in-law and niece! As we make our long 16 hour trip back to Michigan I wanted to make a list of all my favorite moments of this week before I forget!

•digging up clams with the girls
•karate kicking waves
•seeing fun ocean animals-sting rays, dolphins, 8 inch red string worm, baby blue crabs, jelly fish AKA "slimies", sand fleas
•letting clams dig in our hands
•collecting shells with Isabella
•Isabella's nap on my lap
•watching the cousins play together
•Justin walking with ALL the girls by himself
•lunch with mom and Sara

Little Pink Shoes {I Heart Faces-Anything But a Face)

I did a photo shoot with good friends of mine who where expecting their 4th baby...a baby girl! I just love this photo of them...and her little shoes! Check out all the other non-face photos at I Heart Faces this week!

A Snippet of the Day-2

It's not terribly exciting...but I was trying to get Isabella to "Go Crazy" to the Tim McGraw song...she usually does, but she was too into drinking her bottle. :-) Oh well...this is for you, Justin!

A Snippet of the Day-1

Just for you, Justin...a little lunch time fun! We miss you!

Princess Night

So, tonight while Justin was working, I decided to have a Princess Night with the girls! We had so much fun! We all dressed up as our favorite princess or fairy...Malia was Belle...Pressley was Tinkerbell, Isabella was a fairy princess and I busted out an old dress from a Geneva dance and dressed as Cinderella. We watched Enchanted and ate the leftover Mississippi Mud Pie Brownies I made for the Super Bowl with a scoop of ice cream! As we were getting dressed, Malia said to me, "Mommy, you can't wear your hair in a pony tail. You need to either brush it or pull it back half way." I told her she just had to pretend since I hadn't showered today!

Good Times

Today's highlights:

*building a fort out of the dining room table
*playing tag at the YMCA
*Megamind at the dollar theatre
*Isabella's dance moves

Highlights

The best parts of my day...

*slow dancing in the kitchen with Justin
*hide and seek with Isabella
* Pressley- "I have to get my sillies out"
*homemade sushi and fruit pizza

Life in Happy Valley:Townhouse photos

I thought I would post a few photos of our townhouse, now that it's finally in order!!! Enjoy!


I posted the next two to show the views around here...its kinda difficult to see from these photos, but you can get the idea! It's gorgeous!

SLUMBER PARTY!!!

So I took a whirlwind trip to Pittsburgh on Friday. It was intended to be a trip to do a photo shoot for a costume designer...but she canceled on me in the last minute. Oh well. I probably would have been frustrated, but I really didn't feel prepared for this shoot. I kinda felt like I had gotten myself in over my head. It was a LOT of driving in about a 48 hour period, but it ended up being so worth it. We stayed with our good friends, The Bohleys. Their daughter Emma is Malia's very best friend and their son Mikey is Pressley's boyfriend, and their youngest son, Joshy, has declared his intent to marry Isabella some day in the future. To top it off, they just had a beautiful new baby girl last month...and I was able to snap a few photos of her while we were there! She's so cute! Probably the best part of the visit, though, was that Malia had her first slumber party/sleepover. I let her stay with Emma in her room on Friday night. I have no idea how late they went to bed. I fell asleep after 11 and I think they were still going strong. Pressley had every intention of sleeping on the floor beside Malia, but she claimed she was scared (even though the lights were on). I think she was just tired, so she crashed with Isabella and me...she was out in seconds after laying down on the floor. Malia and Emma were up and ready to start the day at 6:15 (thanks so much to Mike for getting up with them! I didn't hear them at all, so Libby and I were able to sleep in a bit!) We had some delicious chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast, I did a fun little shoot with baby Ava and then the girls and I headed back out on the road to the Trier's house.
We were suppose to spend the afternoon hanging out with Erica, Elly and Mallory until it was time for my shoot, but since it got canceled, we headed to Trax Farm with them for lunch and to let the girls climb on the pumpkins. It was a ton of fun, and I had much more fun taking their pictures instead! I was also able to get home MUCH earlier than expected, so that was nice too!

Francis Chan Video

This is the video I talked about in my "This is it" blog post. It is a MUST SEE! Watch and enjoy!

Catalyst East 2010: Francis Chan from Catalyst on Vimeo.

322 Days

322 Days. That's how much time I have left until Malia goes to kindergarten. Add another 365 days to that and both Malia and Pressley will be in school all day long and I will be at home with only one girl! Things will be so different then. I can't even imagine what that will be like! So, in the meantime, I have made a promise to myself to make the most of these next 322 days with all three girls at home.
While our situation here is definitely not my ideal situation, renting a townhouse rather than owning a home, yet owning a home in Pittsburgh that hasn't sold yet, I have promised myself that I'm going to not make that the focus of this year, but enjoy every second that I have with them before school starts next fall. In attempt to follow through with that promise, we have been craft and fun crazy around here! We've made all kinds of fun Halloween and fall decorations, played in the park that is walking distance from our townhouse, had movie nights at Wegman's, dance parties in the kitchen, baked a homemade cake and enjoyed every minute of swimming at the YMCA! It's been the most fun and memorable moments I've had with everyone! It's been a blast! I hope the next 322 days go in slow motion, but in case they don't (they never do), I've got my camera to capture all these fun moments and freeze them forever!

We are Penn State!

We took a trip to campus tonight to walk around and get some photos with the lion...unfortunately the girl who snapped the one of all of us took some blurry shots, and I didn't realize til I uploaded them :-(...oh well...it's not like we can't do it again! Here are some shots from our night. We had fun!

Out takes

Here are some fun out takes from our Goose, Bug and Bee photo shoot! Some are not edited, but I thought they'd be fun to post!