HaPpy EaStEr

I hope you all had a great Easter!

Cleaning out the Camera Dropoff

The week before my Mother-in-Law passed away was actually a very busy and fun week that I never got to blog about because my life got turned upside down. Well, now that things have leveled out a bit I will show you a few pictures from that week.

Monday~ My brother Brad and his girlfriend Laurie came to visit us for a few hours so they could ride bikes on the river trail by our house. I am so bummed I didn't get a picture of them on their bikes. I guess they will just have to come back and do it again. Tuesday ~ I took the boys to a park near our house to feed the ducks. I had a hard time taking pictures of Sam because he kept trying to get in the water with the ducks. I finally passed my camera off to some guy that had a fancier camera than I did to take some candid shots and I am actually in them, which doesn't happen very often.

Wednesday~ My best friend from childhood, Betheny, came to visit us from Utah with her family. We haven't seen each other since Ben was less than a year old. We now both have had another kid since then. It was so great to see her and spend the afternoon with her family.
Thursday~ At around 9:00 PM I went to the movies for the opening night of the new Twilight movie Breaking Dawn with a few friends. It's always more fun to see these movies with friends that loved the books. We had a great time but didn't get home until after 2:00.

Friday~ I had a hard time moving the next day after staying up so late. I picked up Ben from school and came home to find a few phone calls from some of Tom's family members. Before I could even process who had called Tom walked in the door and told me his mom had just decided to refuse further medical treatment. She either had a few hours to live or a few weeks - we really had no idea at this point. He jumped on the computer to change our flights that we had booked for a few weeks later, and I jumped on the phone to see if my mom could come over and get the kids for a few days. I remember trying to get the kids lunch and I was crying. They didn't seem to notice that I was upset. Ben was being a turkey and I was trying with every ounce of will power to be calm and collected with him. I put the kids down for a nap and left for the airport soon after that. I sat in the airport crocheting and sobbing quietly. When they announced that our flight was going to be delayed 2 hours I was angry. Part of me knew that I was going to miss her last moments here on earth with us. I was right. We missed her passing by about 2 hours. As soon as our plane landed we got a call from Tom's sister Nancy who let us know she was gone. We held each other and sobbed again in the terminal of the airport.

We went to the hospital for a few hours to be with her. I am so glad I had a chance to say goodbye. Once again I didn't get home and in bed until after 2:00 AM.

Saturday~ The next morning when we woke up it was my father-in-law's birthday :0(. That was one of the hardest days I think I have ever had. I spent most of the day cleaning the house just trying to stay busy. We all wandered through the house numbly looking at all the stuff that reminded us of her and her love for us. She was an amazing crafter. Each time we would see each other we would always make sure we had a craft in mind to do together. Her crafts are everywhere in the house. There isn't a single room in their house that hasn't been touched by her and her talents. None of us talked all that much that day.

Karol's visiting teacher came over that morning to deliver a red velvet cake to Bryan (my father in law) for his birthday. That was Karol's specialty. She made it for everyone's birthday. Her visiting teacher let us know that Karol was very insistent that Bryan got this cake today. She had no idea that Karol had passed away the night before. It was such an amazing reminder at how truly thoughtful Karol was. She was always thinking of others and making sure that their needs were met. I miss her!

Christmas Countdown

I really wanted to do an activity each day to help us get into the spirit of Christmas a little more this year. So I made up a list of 24 different things to do each day. I was going to sew something for the count down but I found this super cute one at Joannes and couldn't pass up the thought of not having to do all the work myself only to be frustrated with the end result :0) So here is a list of the activities we did, I changed the order when I slipped them in the pockets and some of them I switched as we went if I knew it was going to be a busy day that day. (I can't say we got all of them done, and I didn't pictures of all of them, come on people no one has that much time during the month of December) We did have a lot of fun with it though!

Leave a comment if you want me to email my list to you.This picture is actually from my parents tree. We only have a little one that the kids can decorate and redecorate all month long. (let me tell you a little about this picture, so I read 3 different places on the internet about how to take this picture changing my ISO, and shutter speed, using a tripod, and a whole lot of other stuff that still doesn't make much sense to me. I worked on it for over an hour (obviously not with Ben). I finally gave up and ended up with a super ugly dark picture. I slipped it into Photoshop and adjusted the lighting a tiny bit and 15 seconds later I came up with this amazing picture done on auto mode. I'm not sure I will ever move out of auto mode!!!!!!!!!!!)

Sam hated the bubbles!!!!

Since we don't have snow in Orange County we made our own with old paper. The boys had a blast imagine what it will be like when they actually get to throw real snow :0)I hate gingerbread so we made a chocolate chip cookie man instead. We also made a few out of rice crispy treats too. Yummy!

Owl Hats

Off all the things I have to blog about I decided to do this one. Why you ask, because I want to add it to my Pinterest board. I tell you I am completely obsessed with Pinterest!

These are the owl hats I made. The picture below is of my niece. I made the hat on our way from Seattle to Idaho for my mother-in-law's funeral, as a thank you gift to her. She rode all the way with us to help me entertain the boys in the back seat. Bless her heart!

True Sadness

One month ago on Nov 18th I experienced true sadness when my Mother-in-law passed away after struggling with chemotherapy from breast cancer. She and I were very close and it was devastating to see her go. To know that my children will never get a chance to know her is heart wrenching. She is an amazing woman with amazing talents and a big heart. My world will never be the same without her. I deeply miss her already :0( I can't believe it has already been a month.

Randy and Liz's Wedding

All right once again I have been MIA.

This time it is for a really good reason. My baby brother Randy got married!!!!!

He asked me to be his photographer for his wedding. Not because I am amazing but because I am cheap for family members ;0) It was my first (and possibly my only) wedding. I had a LOT of fun with it. The weather was terrible, the light was fading fast, and we only had about 30 minutes before the ceremony was going to start. I think there may have been a few butterflies involved in this photo shoot as well :0).
All in all I think we got some really good shots. Lucky for me they are both absolutely beautiful people and are so in love. That always makes photography easier. I still have a lot of edits to do but I thought I would give you a little sneak preview. If you want to see more check them out at my new photography blog here Hope you enjoy looking at them as much as I enjoyed taking them.I can't wait for them to come back from their honeymoon so I can get pictures of them on the beach like we wanted to do on their wedding day. However, I just looked at the weather forecast and it looks like we are going to have rain again on the day they come in. I guess it just isn't meant to be :0( Aren't they so cute together!!!! I am so lucky to have such an amazing new sister-in-law. I absolutely love her! Thanks for trusting me with your pictures guys!

Trunk-or-Treating

This year for Halloween Ben and I were pirates and Sam was our parrot. I found out too late that Tom's pirate costume didn't fit. Then I forgot the fishing poles for the fishing game at home so he had to go back and get them during our little photo shoot.

We are so lucky to have my parents so close to us now!We had a great time at our church trunk-or-treating. The boys love being with their friends at church. The babies are all about 2 weeks apart from each other. They are going to be so fun in Nursery together. Because I didn't make costumes this year I thought I would make them their treat bags. They turned out really well and should hold up for years to come.